Public Bill Committee

[Mr. Greg Pope in the Chair]

New Clause 11

Scope of inspections by the chief inspector
‘In section 147 of the Education and Inspections Act 2006 (c. 40) (inspection of premises in connection with adoption and fostering functions) after subsection (2) insert—
“(2A) The Chief Inspector must consider the promotion of the welfare and safety of a child when carrying out the inspections mentioned in this section.”’.—[Tim Loughton.]

Brought up, read the First time, and motion made [this day], That the clause be read a Second time.

Tim Loughton: I cannot remember where I had got to before lunch, but perhaps I can finish off by saying that the aim of this probing amendment is to tease out a bit more information than was teased out by the amendment that my noble Friend Baroness Morris of Bolton tabled in the House of Lords. We want to ensure that inspections of residential children’s homes are meaningful and not just inspections of the accommodation’s physical suitability. We want to broaden the scope of what is taken into account, so that consideration can be given to the promotion of the child’s welfare and safety.
Much earlier in our proceedings, I gave the example of a children’s home in my constituency. It was a nice converted farmhouse in the middle of the rolling downs of Sussex, but the children were running amok, and their welfare was clearly not being catered for. However, that did not necessarily come out in the Ofsted inspection report, and the new clause is intended to probe such issues. There is no statutory duty to consider the real aim of children’s homes—to promote children’s well-being—and such a duty should be included in the Bill.

Beverley Hughes: I hope that all hon. Members agree that the Government have been very clear about the need to safeguard children and promote their welfare. Indeed, that is an important part of the remit of the new Ofsted, which took over the regulation of children’s social care in April 2007.
Section 119(3) of the Education and Inspections Act 2006, when read with section 117(2), sets out the factors to which the chief inspector must have regard in performing her functions. The first item on the list is
“the need to safeguard and promote the rights and welfare of children”.
That is a core responsibility of Ofsted and the chief inspector; it applies to all their functions, rather than being selectively attached to individual functions.
This morning, the hon. Member for East Worthing and Shoreham set out the intention behind the new clause, which is to secure a broad scope for inspections of children’s homes. Her Majesty’s chief inspector draws her power to inspect children’s homes not from section 147 of the 2006 Act, to which the new clause relates, but from section 148. Section 148 transfers functions under part 2 of the Care Standards Act 2000 from the former Commission for Social Care Inspection to the chief inspector.
There is no disagreement about what we understand the intentions behind the new clause to be. When inspecting children’s homes, however, Ofsted should and does consider a range of matters. Comprehensive law is already in place setting out the appropriate factors that inspectors must consider when inspecting children’s homes and, indeed, any other institutions and services. Sections 22 and 23 of the Care Standards Act, for example, give the Secretary of State the power to make regulations and publish statements of national minimum standards against which children’s homes are inspected. Those regulations and national minimum standards cover a broad range of issues relating to the welfare of children in homes, as well as matters such as the fitness of managers and staff; they are not solely about the premises and material conditions.
When the chief inspector inspects children’s homes, fostering agencies, voluntary support agencies, adoption support agencies and all the other services within her remit, she must, as I explained, have regard to the matters set out in section 117(2) of the 2006 Act. As I said, the first aspect of that remit is
“the need to safeguard and promote the rights and welfare of children”.
For those reasons, new clause 11 is unnecessary. It adds nothing in legislative terms to the existing safeguards for children.
The primary objective is to ensure that as those legislative requirements are implemented, the types of situation outlined by the hon. Gentleman, which may be familiar to other Members, are dealt with to the extent that Ofsted is much more rigorous in ensuring compliance with existing standards, which it is Ofsted’s purpose to oversee. I hope that the hon. Gentleman will accept my assurances and feel able to withdraw the new clause.

Tim Loughton: I am grateful for that answer. In the interest of brevity and elegance, I beg to ask leave to withdraw the motion.

Motion and clause, by leave, withdrawn.

New Clause 12

Adoption targets
‘(1) The Secretary of State shall not impose numerical targets for the number of children in local authority care who are to be adopted.
(2) The Secretary of State shall not offer local authorities financial incentives for increasing the number of children in care who are adopted.’.—[Tim Loughton.]

Brought up, and read the First time.

Tim Loughton: I beg to move, That the clause be read a Second time.
The new clause deals with a rather more weighty subject that has been of concern to many who keep an eye on adoption issues. I flagged up this concern during Committee stage of the Adoption and Children Act 2002, when the law on adoption was changed, and the same concern has been raised in the press and by other hon. Members. It is that a perverse incentive arises from the way in which the Government financially incentivise adoption targets, such that some adoptions may be taking place that do not meet the thresholds for an adoption that would normally need to be met. I shall not give reams of categorical evidence that that is happening—

Kevin Brennan: Is there any?

Tim Loughton: I will if the Under-Secretary wants. There is a suspicion—an impression—that needs to be either allayed or dispelled.
Through the use of certain targeted grants, as announced by various Ministers and confirmed in parliamentary questions answered by Ministers, including the hon. Gentleman and the Minister for Local Government, performance reward grants have operated in past years. According to an answer on 3 September last year, the figures for how much grant money each local authority received between 2004-05 and 2006-07 in relation to their performance on adoption targets were released in a table. The figures show that authorities have been incentivised for meeting national adoption targets. The Under-Secretary defined those targets in an answer to the hon. Member for Birmingham, Yardley (John Hemming) on 23 July. He said
“A national adoption target was announced in 2000 to increase the number of adoptions of looked after children by 40 per cent. by the year ending March 2005, and to exceed this by achieving, if possible, a 50 per cent. increase by the end of March 2006.”—[Official Report, 23 July 2007; Vol. 463, c. 838W.]
Most of us would agree that we need to increase quality adoptions to give damaged children the very best second chance to enjoy the benefits of a stable family life, which might put them back on the straight and narrow, for want of a better phrase. It was particularly envisaged that we would concentrate most on getting children out of the care system who had been there for a long time and ensuring that, if there was no prospect of them going back to their birth parents or kinship family, they would be placed in stable adoptive situations. I think that we all agree with that objective, although there are other countries that take a different approach. The other day I cited Denmark, where in the year before last—the last year for which I have figures—only 20 adoptions took place, but that has much more to do with the flexibility of the system in and out of care, the greater use of residential children’s homes and so on.
I disagreed at the time the 2002 legislation was passed with the use of numerical adoption targets—a very blunt instrument—backed up by financial incentives, which could create a perverse incentive for a local authority that had not met its adoption targets to clamour around desperately at the end of the year to find a few soft targets to boost its adoption figures. Theoretically, that could happen. Although we know that an authority would have to go through all sorts of procedures for the care proceedings and pass the various thresholds, there could be a perverse incentive to try to find some adoption candidates to meet those targets before a year ends.
The fear that something along those lines may be happening is borne out when one looks at the demographics of adoptions that have taken place. I pluck out the example of Hammersmith and Fulham, which has received about £500,000 as a reward for placing more than 100 children for adoption in three years. It exceeded its goal of 101 adoptions and secured 106 by the target deadline. It is interesting to look at what happened after those adoption targets ended—they no longer exist in their old form. The number of babies placed for adoption by that authority fell substantially. In 2005, there were 21, in 2006 there were 23 and in 2007 the figure dropped to 10. The figures are also likely to be low this year. These are not children who have been in the care system for some time, but new babies who are taken from their mothers at an early stage.
I am not trying to undermine the system of fast-track baby adoption that we approved in the 2002 Act. If a mother with or without another parent is incapable of taking on the responsibilities of caring for her baby, there is a case for that child being placed for adoption as soon as possible, subject to the checks, procedures and appeals. I am not just picking on Hammersmith and Fulham; there are many similar cases. If one looks at the overall figure, the number of babies placed for adoption rather than returned to their parents is very high. It increased during the years when the performance targets were operating.
There is a perfectly justified suspicion that the targets are leading to perverse incentives to adopt more children than would normally be adopted, particularly focusing on babies. That does not do anyone any good. I am not trying to suggest that there is systemic abuse of the process, with social workers going around assuming the role of child snatchers, as many in the more sensationalist media would have us believe. Such views have not been beneficial and have not helped the perception and the image of social workers, which we talked about earlier. One way of dispelling that is to say that these targets should not be allowed.
I know that the targets have changed in the last couple of years, but the principle is wrong. The principle can lead to the wrong outcomes and to all sorts of allegations that are harmful to the adoption process and to the work of social workers. The commission on social workers that I chaired concluded that the Government should not use such targets. That is why new clause 12 states the case quite simply. It is a probing new clause, and the Minister will no doubt tell me that it would not fit into this part of the Bill, but it is useful to have this debate none the less. The Government need to state clearly that they will not use these sorts of targets. They must send out a clear message that they will come down heavily on any authority that appears to be over-enthusiastic in its adoptions. We must ensure that we increase adoptions, but we must do so for the right reasons.

Annette Brooke: Does the hon. Gentleman agree that it would be helpful if the Minister explained why there has been little change in the number of adoptions from the older age group while there has been a large increase in adoptions of very young babies? I would sincerely like an explanation for that.

Tim Loughton: The hon. Lady makes a key point. That was why I singled out the increase in the baby figures and the fact that we need to make the most progress in getting the hard-core cases, many of which are difficult and challenging teenagers who are not easy to adopt, out of the care system and into some form of permanent adoption if there is no way they can go back to their birth parents or other members of their family. That is where we are trying to get them. The hon. Lady makes a perfectly pertinent point, so I hope that the Minister will address those concerns in his reply. It is a genuine concern that we need to dispel, because it does no one in the business of adoption any good.

Kevin Brennan: Perhaps I can express a little disappointment with the hon. Gentleman’s contribution on this occasion, just for the sake of symmetry. To be fair, he is usually pretty assiduous in his research and uses real evidence to support his points, but most of what he has just said did not seem to be based on evidence. He used words such as suspicion, impression, hypotheticals and fear, but then proceeded to claim that it does no good to spread suspicion or have those sorts of stories circulating in the wilder corners of the media.
I would like to make a few points absolutely clear. It is wrong to claim that local authorities were incentivised in any way to meet a national adoption target. That is not true and I will explain why later. It has always been and remains the Government’s policy that children should live with their parents whenever possible and that when necessary, families should be given extra support to help keep them together. Naturally, the expectations placed on local authorities through legislation reflect that policy.
The hon. Member for East Worthing and Shoreham was a member of the Committee that scrutinised the Children and Adoption Bill a few years ago, so he knows that the national adoption target, which ended in March 2006, applied only to the number of adoptions of children who were already in care and waiting to be placed for adoption and to the speeding up of that process, which we all agreed had to be improved. Those targets reflected the Government’s desire to reverse the long-term decline in the number of children already in care achieving permanent adoption.
The purpose of those targets was to give hundreds more of our most vulnerable children the chance to benefit from a safe, stable and loving family life and fulfil their potential. That is exactly the right thing to do, so I make no apology for it whatever. Local authorities were neither compelled to meet national adoption targets, nor financially rewarded against them. Having run its course and achieved its purpose, the national adoption target was not extended beyond March 2006 and the Government currently have no plans to reintroduce it.
Local authorities are relevant in this respect because some of them chose to develop local adoption targets as part of the local area agreements, formerly known as local public service agreements. As with the national target, those targets were focused on children already in the care system. In other words, some councils judged themselves weak at helping children find new families in a timely way and chose their own local targets that were linked, in general with other issues, to the rewarding of funding. The Government never imposed adoption targets on individual local authorities in any way whatever. Indeed, as I think the hon. Member for East Worthing and Shoreham acknowledged, the local government White Paper commitments mean that the Government will now only agree targets with local authorities against indicators drawn from the national indicator set, which contains no indicator for measuring the number of adoptions from care.
The first point is that any targets that existed, whether the national target set by the Government or those that a local authority decided to set for itself, are no longer in place. As I have said, I make no apology at all for the national target set by the Government, because it successfully improved the speed at which children were able to go through the care system when they were already judged suitable for adoption. In the new system there will be no financial incentives for performance against specific targets; instead, local areas will be able to earn limited reward funding based on average performance across a range of targets agreed with the Government and their local authorities, but adoption will not be included.

Annette Brooke: Did that target specify how long the children needed to have been in care? Could they have been in care for just a day or two?

Kevin Brennan: The national target was to increase by 40 per cent.—more if possible—the number of looked-after children who were adopted within a specified time. That target was not quite reached—38 per cent. was the outcome figure. All councils were meant to bring their performance up to that level. If I have not answered the hon. Lady’s question, she might want to come back on that.

Annette Brooke: My question was whether the target specified how long the children that one wished to move out of care had been in care. Could an authority count children who had only been in care for seven days?

Kevin Brennan: I apologise to the hon. Lady. The target was nothing to do with how long the children had been in care, it was about whether they had been in care and judged suitable for adoption. It would be impossible for them to be part of a target if they had been in care for just one day. The target kicked in only after a judgment had been made that adoption was the right route. If they had been in care for only one day, they would not yet have been assessed as suitable for adoption.

Edward Timpson: Will the Minister clarify whether when he says that the child had been judged suitable for adoption he means that the child had then been placed through the adoption panel?

Kevin Brennan: Yes, that is absolutely correct. That is the point at which the target would kick in. When we debated the Adoption and Children Bill in 2001, concern was expressed that too many children were languishing in care when it had already been decided—the paramountcy principle having been considered—that the appropriate way forward for them was to be placed for adoption. They were not being placed for adoption quickly because local authorities were not being very effective or efficient in finding the right family for them. That was the purpose of the national adoption target, and it was successful.

Tim Loughton: Just to be clear on the point made by the hon. Member for Mid-Dorset and North Poole, on the back of the accelerated adoption processes for babies in particular—which we enabled through the Adoption and Children Act 2002—more babies could come into the care system and be quickly adopted, and they therefore formed part of the adoption figures that met the adoption targets. That would appear to be borne out by the fact that the biggest increase in adoptions has been in the adoption of young babies. That is the case, is it not?

Kevin Brennan: The key safeguard in all cases is that no child can be adopted unless it has been through the proper procedures, including the court procedures. We all agreed, and it was absolutely the case, that where it was appropriate that a baby be placed for adoption it should happen quickly. What are being conflated in the argument, perhaps deliberately in some cases—not here but in some of the media accounts—are the local area agreement targets and the national target on adoption. There is no evidence at local target level that the policy has resulted in any inappropriate adoptions—none whatever. In fact, the available evidence suggests that local authorities that included time-limited adoption increases as part of their local public service agreement were already well below average in using adoption as a permanent option for looked-after children in comparison to other local authorities. They set fairly modest targets, as the hon. Member for East Worthing and Shoreham indicated, and even when they achieved those targets in full, the individual local authorities involved rarely became above average performers in terms of adoption as a permanent option, even in the short term while the targets were in place.
I have seen no evidence of inappropriate adoptions resulting from the target. It is very sad that some accounts—not from anybody on the Committee, but elsewhere—have given the impression that Ministers, judges, social workers, lawyers, solicitors, CAFCASS officers and a range of other people are involved in some sort of conspiracy to kidnap babies from otherwise loving families to meet adoption targets. That sort of swivel-eyed nonsense is exactly what contributes to our problems in improving the image of social workers and in ensuring that children in care, whom the Bill is largely designed to assist, have the best possible outcomes. The extent to which we pander to those views is very dangerous to what we are trying to do.
Let us base our deliberations on evidence. There is no evidence of inappropriate adoptions. There are no national targets in place now, the national target having achieved its outcome. Councils set local targets for themselves because they felt that they needed to challenge their poor performance; the Government did not set them. They are no longer in place and there is no evidence whatever that they resulted in inappropriate adoptions. I see no need to adopt an amendment that would tie the hands of future Governments seeking to improve adoption performance, although targets are not currently needed because of the improvements made directly as a result of the 2002 Act and the national target set at that time.
I call for consensus on adoption across the Committee and across the parties in the House, and hope that we can reach it. Given that no targets are in place at this point, and that the hon. Member for East Worthing and Shoreham fundamentally disagrees with targets, consensus should be possible without the necessity for his amendment. On that basis, I invite him to withdraw it.

Tim Loughton: We needed to have this discussion. I think the Minister and I are entirely at one on what needs to be achieved, which is an increase in adoption, particularly for those who are in the care system for far too long and in many cases spend their entire youth in the care system without the chance of adoption. I have been very careful not to make wild allegations about inappropriate adoptions. One cannot deny, however, that the system is such that they could happen, nor could one say that they would not happen. There would be no question of anybody pandering to the allegations if the Government had not introduced the performance reward grants in the first place, or subsequently allowed local authorities to include any adoption target within local area agreements. That is where the problems come in and that is what we warned about in 2001. A question remains. I am interested in further analysis from the Minister’s Department as to why there has been such a big increase in the adoption of babies, which is part of the targets, but little movement in the adoption of older children, on whom we should be concentrating.

Kevin Brennan: I will be happy to send the hon. Gentleman some further information on that point. It is true that more children aged between zero and one are coming into care, but the compensating figure for children aged between one and four balances that. In other words, early intervention is working exactly as we want it to. We have learned the lessons about the need to ensure that we intervene early where children are genuinely at risk and the statistics absolutely bear that out.
However, does the hon. Gentleman not accept that for those aspersions to be true in some way—aspersions that the system conspired to put people up for adoption inappropriately—the court system itself and the judges involved in it would have to have been part of that conspiracy?

Tim Loughton: I entirely take the Minister’s point and I am not suggesting that there was a conspiracy. However, the evidence supplied by social workers closest to the case will weigh heavily in court and, without there having to be any sort of conspiracy, if a claim is being made by an employee of the local authority and that authority stands to benefit from a performance reward grant, clearly there is the potential for that employee to over-egg the claim when otherwise they might not have done so. That situation does not require a conspiracy.
Part of the problem is the pressure on the courts at the moment. I have sat in family courts where the judge will tell me that there have been changes in social workers and the paperwork is enormous—we will go on to talk about transparency in family courts when we discuss another amendment very shortly—so I know that the scrutiny of some of these cases is not as tight as it might be. On that basis, some of these numbers, hypothetically, could be raised higher than we would like.
The point is that, ultimately, the overall adoption figures have not risen recently and we need them to rise; in particular, we need them to rise more for older children than for babies. That is a real problem that we need to face. However, I hope that when the Minister endeavours to tackle it again—I realise that all sorts of things are happening that are ongoing—he will not revert to coming up with some sort of financial incentive that is based on numerical targets, because that will only give rise to further suspicions that children are being inappropriately adopted at an early age who would otherwise not necessarily justify being adopted.
I do not wish to put this matter to a vote. On that basis, I am grateful for the debate that we have had and I beg to ask leave to withdraw the motion.

Greg Pope: If the Minister is going to write to Mr. Loughton, it might be helpful if that correspondence was copied to other members of the Committee.

Motion and clause, by leave, withdrawn.

New Clause 13

Responsibilities of parenthood
‘(1) In section 10 of the Children Act 1989 (c. 41) (power of court to make section 8 orders), after subsection (9)(b) insert—
“(ba) in relation to residence orders, whether or not the person with whom it is proposed that the child should live is likely to be able and willing to accept the responsibilities of parenthood in relation to the child;”.
(2) In section 8 of that Act (residence, contact and other orders with respect to children), after subsection (4) insert—
“(4A) In this Part “the responsibilities of parenthood” means, in so far as is practicable and in the best interests of the child, the safeguarding and promotion of the child’s health, development and welfare, and the provision of direction and guidance to the child in a manner appropriate to his age and development.”’.—[Tim Loughton.]

Brought up, and read the First time.

Tim Loughton: I beg to move, That the clause be read a Second time.

Greg Pope: With this, it will be convenient to discuss the following: New clause 17—Issue of written judgment relating to a court order in family proceedings—
‘(1) The 1989 Act is amended as follows.
(2) After section 8 insert—
“8A Issue of written judgment relating to a court order in family proceedings
(1) When issuing an order in any family proceedings a court shall issue a written judgment in respect of that order.
(2) No children under the age of 16 shall be identified by name in that judgment.
(3) A judgment issued under subsection (1) will be issued to all parties to proceedings.
(4) Parents of children in family proceedings who were party to those proceedings, may publish the judgment issued under subsection (1).
(5) Parents of children in family proceedings, who were party to those proceedings, may publish any other documents that are part of such proceedings on the condition that documents are redacted to remove the names of any children under 16.”’.
New clause 18—Family proceedings: evidence—
‘(1) The 1989 Act is amended as follows.
(2) After section 9 insert—
“9A Proceedings on orders with respect to children
(1) No order may be made in any family proceedings that shall prevent the provision of evidence to—
(a) the police,
(b) any regulatory body that the Secretary of State shall by regulation define.
(2) In the course of such proceedings it shall be lawful for any person—
(a) to provide evidence to the bodies specified in subsection (1),
(b) to assist any person in the provision of such evidence.
(3) In relation to any family proceedings held in private it shall be lawful for any person to provide any information relating to such proceedings to—
(a) a Member of Parliament,
(b) a Member of the Welsh Assembly,
(c) a Member of the European Parliament,
(d) such other persons as the Secretary of State shall by regulation define.
(4) In relation to any family proceedings held in private it shall be lawful for any person to provide any information relating to such proceedings to any other person for the purposes of obtaining advice, performing research or ensuring the enforcement of the law or regulatory procedures.”’.

Tim Loughton: It is slightly unfortunate that new clause 13 has been grouped with new clauses 17 and 18, which the hon. Member for Mid-Dorset and North Poole will be speaking to in more detail; I will just touch on them.
New clause 13 is another new clause that was tabled and debated in the House of Lords; it was originally tabled by Lord Northbourne. He sought to clarify and embed in law the responsibilities that a person assumes when they accept the responsibility of caring for a child who will live with them as a result of a residence order. It is critical for the child and for the parents of that child, who the child is not living with, that the child receives the parenting that they need. So this is purely a probing amendment to engage in a discussion of what parenthood is all about and what the responsibilities of parenthood are.
The Minister and I can have—indeed, we have had—endless debates about over-nannying states and ill-equipped parents and so forth. Actually, however, it is fundamental to the Bill to establish what qualifies somebody to take on the role of a parent if the birth parents are deemed to be no longer capable of doing that.
The reason that I raise this issue now is that, at the end of the debate in the Lords, Lord Adonis indicated that the Government were prepared to look at it further and I just wondered whether there has been any progress since then. Therefore, the Minister will have the opportunity to update the Committee if there is anything to report back on.
New clauses 17 and 18, grouped with new clause 13, are in the name of the hon. Member for Birmingham, Yardley and other hon. Members, and I have added my name to those of my hon. Friends who are supporting them. These new clauses address an issue that has been the subject of much debate in the press and on which we had hoped that there would also have been some movement in Government as a result of the consultation that took place on the transparency of the family courts. However, that consultation largely came to nothing, so they deal with the problems of transparency within the family courts.
I have strong reservations about the watertightness—that is not a good word to use—of the family court system. I have sat in on family courts and my hon. Friend the Member for Crewe and Nantwich may wish to make comments about his much greater personal experience. There is great pressure on the officers and agencies that are privy to family court proceedings, not least on social workers. There is a large turnover in social workers attached to cases. I have given the example of when I sat in court for a day and the judge told me that all the social workers he had seen were different from the ones who had started the cases he was judging. For those reasons, there is a propensity for mistakes to happen and for wrong records to be taken. That can easily happen, but often those wrong records are not corrected and erroneous information is resurrected later in proceedings. Because different social workers are often involved, that information is taken as gospel.
It is essential that we provide for far greater transparency in family court proceedings so that when mistakes are made they can be challenged. It is important that it is seen to be challenged and that the correct information is seen to be put on the record to the satisfaction of all parties involved. I recognise that that must be done sensitively. I am not coming up with a blueprint for how transparency in the family courts could be achieved. Such procedures would have to take account of the child’s right to anonymity and of whether members of the public should be allowed in to see the court proceedings. That raises all sorts of potential issues. For example, a vexatious neighbour might want to make mischief by sitting in on family court proceedings. That could cause problems.
Despite those problems, it should be possible to publish court proceedings for the appropriate people so that there is a greater chance for scrutiny. Connected persons might wish to say, “Hold on, that’s not true,” or “This was thrown out at an earlier stage,” or “It was pointed out that that was not true.” That would improve the system.
I understand why reform of the family court system was largely terminated when the Leader of the House was responsible for it. I had a private meeting with her when she was very keen to progress this issue. The confidentiality of children’s concerns was an important factor. That was an interesting angle that not many people had considered at the outset. However, the problem still remains. We see it as constituency MPs, when it is usually aggrieved fathers who come to us. Some of the more militant of them unhelpfully get involved with the organisations that we can all think of, but which we need not name. That escalates the matter, which is in nobody’s interests, least of all the children about whom we should care most.
The new clauses would lay down a framework for publishing court proceedings and for determining who had access to them. I thought that we had addressed part of this issue in the Children Act 2004. At that time, the sister of the Leader of the House was involved in a case where she unwittingly disclosed information about a family court case to her, which was deemed to be against the law. I thought that we amended the 2004 Act. I tabled an amendment whereby constituents could discuss their cases with their MP without falling foul of the confidentiality of the family courts. I understand that there are still problems.
The new clauses would start the ball rolling to improve the transparency of, and therefore the confidence in, the family court system. These are probing new clauses so the Minister can say why they may or may not be practical. Perhaps he might explain what it would take for changes to be made in the system to give greater assurances to the many aggrieved people who come to us because of the court proceedings.

Edward Timpson: I know from my own experience that there has been an increase in the number of written judgments issued and approved by judges in controversial family law cases, particularly those that have then crept into the criminal arena such as cases of non-accidental injury. There has also been an increase in cases being judged worthy of publication through bad practice, not only from local authorities, but from other agencies. Does my hon. Friend therefore agree that a presumption that there would be a written judgment in a family case, unless there was good reason not to do so, such as for public interest immunity or the particular sensitivity of the case, would at least be a starting point in opening up the family courts to a more transparent way forward?

Tim Loughton: My hon. Friend makes a very good point, which is obviously born out of his experience in this area. Clearly something has to be done. Many hon. Members from their own experiences both with their constituents and in their professional and legal backgrounds have a contribution to make here. It is not a subject that will go away. An increase in the publication of written judgments will go some way to allay the suspicions that things are being swept under the carpet. Again, as with our last debate, I am being careful not to scaremonger, but this is an increasingly widely touted concern that needs to be addressed. I will not detain the Committee for any longer. Hon. Members want to make some comments and then we want to hear what the Minister proposes as a way forward.

Annette Brooke: I would like to place on record that I am not in the business of pandering to the media or any other people. Nevertheless, cases come to light. There are questions and it is difficult to answer the accusations at times in the current situation. It would be for the greatest good if we could manage to progress openness and transparency in some way. I was keen that we should have a discussion in Committee because that is the most appropriate way to tease out some ideas on the way forward. I was quite taken with the suggestion from the hon. Member for Crewe and Nantwich, which I have also heard made by judges.
I am a little bit concerned about new clause 17 because it does not seem to cover the welfare of the child. However, I appreciate the sentiments behind it and I want more openness. A lot of progress was made and the former Constitutional Affairs Committee published a report on family courts. There was a lot of evidence on how we could progress to more openness. Of course we must respect the views of young people because we are repeatedly saying that we should seek their views, but I feel that we should try to find a way around this to dispel the myths and suspicion.
New clause 18, to which I put my name to ensure that it was discussed, has some rather important elements. We have to assume that there will occasionally be a miscarriage of justice. There will occasionally be mistakes by medical experts. There will occasionally be mistakes by social services staff. It concerns me that although wild allegations are around us all the time, if we could just put some more checks and balances into the system, we might be able to tighten it up more.
The specifics here, which seem fairly reasonable to me—I am ready to be contradicted—are that someone should be able to go to the police if they have evidence contrary to that which has been provided. An example was given of two parents, one blaming the other for maltreating the child. Although the silence aspect has been addressed, false allegations could be made, and somebody—perhaps a family member—might want to go to the police.
There is also an issue about the right of the party whose child might be taken away to see a further expert witness. I see the problem with that—they could go on and on with expert witnesses—but there are a few well-documented cases in which the judge, when publishing his views, has acknowledged that a wrong medical procedure took place that led to a whole sequence of events. It is easy to see that once one gets on the treadmill and it is suggested that an injury is non-accidental, it can colour everything that happens. I would always want to put child protection first—the welfare of the child is paramount—but there should be scope, for example, to bring in one’s own expert witness so some assessment could be made in court.
The new clause also includes Members of Parliament and their equivalents in other parliamentary bodies. Many of us thought that that was dealt with by an amendment to the Children Act 2004, but I am told that that is not the case. It puts Members of Parliament in a difficult position when people come to our surgeries and we are not sure what we can do or whether we should be hearing the evidence. Some clarity on that is needed. Surely somebody can be acknowledged who is totally trustworthy, so people can bring information to them and seek their advice.
Those are just a few comments. I genuinely want to tease out as much as we can in Committee, because I suspect that we will return to the issues on Report, and I would like to get as much on record here as possible.

Kevin Brennan: I understand the hon. Lady’s comments. As the hon. Member for East Worthing and Shoreham pointed out, my hon. Friend Lord Adonis undertook to consider clause 13 further, and we have done so. At the specific suggestion of Lady Butler-Sloss, the Government sought the views of the president of the family division of the High Court and, through him, other senior judges with experience of family cases and members of the Family Justice Council. The common view of those experienced practitioners was that they have had no difficulties managing cases using the current wording of section 3 of the Act, which defines parental responsibility as
“all the rights, duties, powers, responsibilities and authority which by law a parent of a child has in relation to the child and his property.”
A number of senior judges who were consulted further foresaw problems with a fuller definition such as the one proposed. For example, such a definition would risk becoming a focus of conflict or a cause for further argument between parents, both of whom say that the statutory definition entitles them to do something unless prohibited from doing so. The view is summed up in a letter of advice sent to Lord Adonis by the president of the family division saying that the proposed amendment
“is neither necessary nor helpful.”
He believes that
“to introduce and define a new concept of the responsibilities of parenthood in the form of amended section 8(4A) will create scope for argument and confusion in an area in which none of the many judges I have canvassed at all levels has ever found the existing definition to present any practical difficulties”.
The Government have also considered referring the matter to the Law Commission, recognising that the commission itself recommended the current definition in its 1988 report “Family Law: Review of Child Law: Guardianship and Custody”. However, setting to one side the time that it might take to hear further from the commission, the view of those consulted was that, in the absence of any substantive concerns about the current position, such a referral is unnecessary.
It is worth noting that during the course of the consultations, our attention was drawn to a leading judgment by the then Mr. Justice Wall, in the case of Re F (Shared Residence Order) [2003] 2 FLR 397, which set out an extended list, the contents of which might be relevant in residence order cases. That case law approach is echoed in one of the parenting plans, “Putting Children First - a planner for separating parents”, which was published by my Department and is now distributed primarily by the Children and Family Court Advisory and Support Service, with more than 70,000 copies distributed last year.
I believe that the intention behind the new clause, as was made clear when it was first considered in the other place, is to assist the courts, parents, relatives and, above all, the children who might become the subject of residence order proceedings. It would do so by ensuring that those acquiring parental responsibility by that route are clear about what they are taking on and that they are suitable to fulfil that vital role. That is an extremely laudable aim, but given the strength of the advice we received and the expertise of those whose views have been provided to us by the president of the family division, the Government have concluded that those whom we want to assist, namely the children involved, would be better served by the continuation of the status quo in this case and that there are positive advantages to that position. I am sure that the Committee will understand that. The president has advised that
“the full range of powers and duties of the parent...change and develop as both the child and the law and practice of parenting change and develop”.
The Government accept that view and consider that there should not be a refinement or further iteration of the meaning of parental responsibility within the Act.
On new clause 17, I understand the sentiments expressed in the debate and that the new clause is intended to make the family courts more open by requiring them to provide written judgments to all parties in family cases and allowing those people receiving judgments and other documents to publish them further, potentially even in the media. The arrangements for providing judgments in family courts depend on the level of the court involved, as I am sure hon. Members know, and courts are always required to explain their decisions to the parties, but there is no requirement in the county court or the High Court for the explanation to be given in writing; often, they are only given orally and a tape recording is made. It is only in the family proceedings court that there is a requirement to produce and issue written reasons to the parties. Like the hon. Member for East Worthing and Shoreham and other hon. Members, I have sat in on those courts and observed the proceedings.
The Ministry of Justice has consulted twice, as hon. Members will know in recent years, on increasing the openness of family courts, and central to that has been the recognition of the need for better provision of information about the work of the family courts. It needs to be accessible to those who are involved in the proceedings, but it is also important that more information is available to the general public, for the reasons hon. Members have outlined during the debate. We need to help people to understand how the courts make those difficult and important decisions so that the public can have confidence in the family justice system.
The decision on whether to publish judgments or permit information from a case to be published more widely rests with the courts. In broad terms, it makes that decision by balancing the best interests of the child with the interests of justice and the public interest in the issues raised by the case. It will include consideration of the rights of the parties and the media to freedom of expression under article 10 of the European convention on human rights and the European convention on the rights of the child, as well as consideration of the parties’ rights to privacy under article 8 of the convention on human rights. When the Court of Appeal or the High Court considers the case to have significant public interest, it is common practice for the judgment, which is anonymised to protect the interests of the parties, particularly the children involved, to be published in the law reports and on the British and Irish Legal Information Institute website.
We want to encourage more judgments to be published, but need to balance that with the demands that publication places on the efficient operation of the system. We must not risk further delays in the family courts when we have been working hard to reduce delays. Those delays directly impact on the children and parents involved in proceedings. Last summer, the Ministry of Justice announced that it would be piloting written judgments when a final order is made in certain family cases, and I can confirm that an announcement about those pilots will be made to the House after the summer.
New clause 18 would amend the Children Act 1989 so that the courts could not prevent the disclosure of evidence to the police or any regulatory body. It would make such disclosure lawful while the proceeds are ongoing and make it lawful to provide information to an MP, a Member of the Welsh Assembly or a Member of the European Parliament. It would also make disclosure lawful for obtaining advice, performing research and ensuring law enforcement or compliance with regulatory proceedings. I understand that the new clause is intended to enable people who find themselves and their children in family proceedings to make wider disclosure of information from those proceedings than is currently possible without potentially being in contempt of court.
The disclosure of information for those involved in family proceedings is an issue that interests hon. Members across the House. I understand that the intention is to overcome some of the problems faced by people involved in family proceedings who wish to disclose information or documents that form part of the proceedings to their MP, for example, for any number of reasons. I understand the concern that prompted the new clause. The changes that have already been made are not entirely complete, because there is a problem with what can be disclosed to an MP while proceedings are ongoing.
For are a number of reasons, I cannot agree to the new clause. First, in October 2005 we changed the rules of court that govern the disclosure of family court information, making it easier for people involved in family proceedings to get advice and support and to disclose certain information in given circumstances without the prior permission of the court. Those changes sensibly allow people to share information legitimately with close family members, McKenzie friends and health professionals. We also made changes so that people can share information with the police to help with a criminal investigation—as the hon. Member for Crewe and Nantwich mentioned—or to protect children. People may also share some information with their MP to investigate a complaint or raise a question of policy or procedure. Those changes have helped people to get help and support. They have also made it easier for people to make a complaint to the General Medical Council. After seeing three years of the changes in action, we think that further changes may be needed. That is why in June last year, the Justice Secretary consulted further on the rules and whether further changes were needed.
The second reason for not accepting the new clause is that this is a difficult and sensitive area, so we must be careful in our approach. We must balance one individual’s right to privacy against another individual’s wish to share documents or details of court proceedings that might breach that privacy. As hon. Members are aware, many of the documents we are talking about contain highly sensitive and personal information, including medical records, details of people’s mental health status and so on. We need to be alert to how damaging it could be for an individual if such information was disclosed inappropriately. However, we must also keep it in mind that people involved in family proceedings will often seek advice and support, and we must ensure that they can do so in a simple and timely manner. That is why we consulted on disclosure last year.
As I have mentioned, the Government will make an announcement to the House after the summer, following the consultation, and make further detailed proposals. In developing our policies, we want to work with the Family Procedure Rule Committee on any amendment to court rules. Given that work is ongoing and that there is an impending announcement from the Ministry of Justice, it would be premature at this stage to consider accepting new clauses 17 and 18. I think that we are all travelling in the same direction and want to achieve the correct balance. In the light of what I have said, I hope that hon. Members will not press the new clauses.

Tim Loughton: The Minister has given a full answer. I am encouraged by his assurance that further consideration will come forward in the autumn. On that basis, I beg to ask leave to withdraw the motion.

Motion and clause, by leave, withdrawn.

New Clause 14

Payment of fees
‘(1) Section 49 of the Children Act 2004 (c. 31) (payment to foster parents) is amended as follows.
(2) After subsection (4) insert—
“(5) Payment of the fee to a foster parent should continue until a qualifying determination has been reached.”’.—[Mr. Timpson.]

Brought up, and read the First time.

Edward Timpson: I beg to move, That the clause be read a Second time.

Greg Pope: With this it will be convenient to discuss new clause 40—Complaints against foster carers—
‘(1) The 1989 Act is amended as follows.
(2) After section 26(8) insert—
“(9) In carrying out any consideration of any representations (including complaints) every local authority shall—
(a) take such steps as are reasonably practicable to protect the identity of foster carers who are the subject of a complaint; and
(b) continue to pay allowances to such foster carers until it has reached a decision on the complaint.”’.

Edward Timpson: It falls to me to speak to new clauses 14 and 40, which stand in the names of hon. Members from all parties on the Committee. It would be remiss of me not to say to you, Mr. Pope, that it has been a delight to serve under your chairmanship on my first Committee.
The new clauses deal with two principal issues. The first is the requirement that local authorities continue payments to a foster carer or foster carers until a determination is reached regarding an allegation made against them. The second is the protection of the identity of foster carers who are subject to complaints. There is a general consensus in the Committee that social workers have not been valued and that that needs to be recognised in the legislation. It seems to me and my colleagues that the same can be said of foster carers. I should say at the outset that the welfare and protection of children in public care is the primary consideration at the core of the new clauses.
It is important to say that foster carers provide a valuable and vital service that is complex and highly specialised. They perform a hugely demanding role, and many do so full time. Given those demands, foster carers often receive no earnings through employment or lose earnings through reduced hours. They therefore make an enormous commitment.
The dearth of foster carers has been a theme during our consideration of the Bill. In 2000, the book “Delivering Foster Care” made it clear how deep that dearth was, saying:
“In order to meet the demand for placement and to ensure a choice of placements that can best meet children’s needs, at least 10,000 more foster carers are needed in the UK”.
That was said in 2000, but it remains true today. What makes those figures even more pertinent, however, is that the current population of foster carers is ageing, with one fifth over 56—and that includes my own parents.
If we are to increase the pool of foster carers, we need to send out a signal that we are on their side. One reason for the lack of take-up is the lack of protection afforded to foster carers in carrying out their role and particularly during the investigation of allegations. Unlike members of the teaching profession, foster carers do not benefit from such protection, and the consequences are potentially hugely damaging, not only for the individual foster carer, but for the fostering service as a whole. Any foster carer who has been through the investigative process, as a third of all foster carers have, will say two things: first, that it is a tremendously traumatic experience that leaves them in constant fear of further allegations and undue public vilification; and secondly, that the financial impact can be devastating.
Hon. Members will have seen the helpful briefing from the Fostering Network, which sets out a number of case studies. One of those case studies is as follows:
“A child made an allegation against a male carer, which was later proved unfounded. The couple had been out of work and the fostering income was relied on for all their outgoings. They were struggling and subsequently, as the ‘investigation’ took so long (over 2 months at this point) without an income, the couple were given notice by their building society. They have since been forced to sell their house to a company which then rents them back. They are in a very precarious position which has lost them their equity”.
That cannot be right.
The problem is compounded by the Government time scales for the resolution of allegations, as set out in the “Working Together” guidance of April 2006. Those time scales are being routinely missed. The target is 80 per cent. resolution by one month and 90 per cent. resolution by three months, but the actual figures show that 50 per cent. of cases run for more than three months, one in 10 runs for more than a year, and some run for several years.
During an investigation, almost all foster carers have their fostering income cut, and 46 per cent. have all their fostering income stopped. Despite the unfair and severe financial hardship that is laid at the door of foster carers, the majority of allegations prove unfounded—I would be interested to know whether the Minister has specific figures showing what that majority is. Certainly, in more than two thirds of cases, children are not removed from the foster carers’ care on completion of the investigation.
The repercussions of any investigation are widespread. We must bear it in mind that foster carers are often involved in other child care occupations, in parallel with their fostering commitments. An investigation might therefore threaten their other sources of family income.
The British Association for Adoption and Fostering makes a strong argument when it says:
“Due to the nature of children and young people placed with them and the often fraught relationships between foster carers and birth parents unfounded allegations are a regular occurrence.”
I know of a teenage girl who was moved from placement to placement after making unfounded allegation upon unfounded allegation, purely because her birth mother encouraged her to disrupt the placements. She was told that if she did so enough times she would eventually be returned home, as the least worst option.
Any allegation has the potential to trigger one of three types of investigation: a child protection inquiry under section 47 of the Children Act 1989; the fostering service’s own investigation; and, of course, a police investigation. A third of foster carers are subject to an investigation at some time during their fostering career, and the majority of allegations prove to be unfounded, which only heightens the case for greater protection of their identity, to mirror the protection given to teachers whose role in children’s lives has, in many ways, a professional symmetry with that of foster carers.

Tim Loughton: My hon. Friend makes a very good case for the new clause. Does the Fostering Network not also say that 10 per cent. of such allegations take longer than a year to investigate? That means an extended period of uncertainty in which the foster carers may not be looking after their charges, although we desperately need their services because of the shortage of appropriate foster care, as has already been mentioned.

Edward Timpson: My hon. Friend is right. I think that I alluded to the figure of one in 10 earlier. The point about investigations lasting a year or more is that the foster carers in question are out of the fostering pool during that period of suspension. That is a resource that we can ill afford to lose. My plea to the Government is that they think again and commit to bringing to an end once and for all the unjust position in which foster carers are singled out for financial penalty and potential public exposure and humiliation following unfounded allegations.
There are local authorities, such as Portsmouth, that have already recognised the absolute necessity of financial entitlement for foster carers during the period of investigation and have implemented such a system. On that point, and on the issue of identity protection, my colleagues who support the new clause urge the Government to do the same and support the proposed changes in their entirety.

David Kidney: Like other hon. Members, I have tabled a new clause on this subject because I support the proposal that foster carers should be paid while they are under investigation following an allegation. I do not intend to give a view on the rightness of allegations in any individual case, nor do I come at the matter with any particular assumption about whether an allegation might be valid or false. The memory is fresh in my mind of two sisters, who are now adults, and who, as children, made a complaint about abuse. They came to see me to tell me how inadequately their felt their allegations were investigated. However, it is a fact, as the Fostering Network briefing says, that
“around a third of all foster carers will face an allegation during their fostering career and the vast majority of these turn out to be unfounded.”
The Fostering Network deserves much credit for its campaign on the issue. It has marshalled its facts well; its arguments are cogent; and it has been quite attuned to the parliamentary process in trying to influence decision makers. My hon. Friend the Under-Secretary will recall that I brought a delegation from the Fostering Network to see him, and the present subject was among the matters that we discussed. My hon. Friend gave a very sympathetic reception to the points that they made. On Second Reading, the Fostering Network arranged a lobby of Parliament by foster carers. The focus on that day was on children staying put with foster carers after 18, but this issue was discussed as well.
I have found in preparing for the debate that Unison is a major trade union in social care and has strong views in support of the Fostering Network. Its briefing to hon. Members reminds us of the
“emotional strain and the considerable length of time”
that foster carers might be worrying about an allegation made against them, as well as the loss of income. It makes the point that people might be able to manage the emotional strain and the worry, but they certainly cannot manage without the money. Unison says that it is crucial to ensure that good foster carers do not move out of fostering because they are compelled to do so by the lack of money, even though at the end of the investigation it might be found that indeed they are good foster carers with no stain on their character from the allegation that was made. Unison states:
“We believe that foster carers should continue, where paid, to receive their fee payment (the money given as remuneration for their work, skills and experience) and a portion of their allowance (the money paid to cover the cost of looking after children) that relates to ongoing fostering costs during an investigation.”
The hon. Member for Crewe and Nantwich made the point that often the timetable for completing an investigation given in Government guidance is missed. That is a scandal in itself. Acceptance of the proposal that people continue to be paid during an investigation might be an extra incentive for local authorities to ensure that their investigations comply with the time limit. In that way, it might have a second benefit in addition to the benefit of maintaining foster carers’ incomes while they are under investigation. That is why I support new clause 14.

Annette Brooke: I, too, will start by thanking the Fostering Network for bringing these important issues to our attention in a very powerful way—through the meetings with foster carers and looked-after children.
Unfounded allegations will undoubtedly be made, because we are talking about often very troubled children who will feel the need to hit back. Making such allegations is one manifestation of that impulse. However, given what we hear after the events in various children’s homes—I have a constituent who was placed with a foster carer many years ago and it was proven that he was abused while in that care—it is vital that allegations are investigated properly. It is also important that there should be pressure to complete investigations in a timely fashion.
Most of all, payment of the fee to the foster parent while the investigation is taking place is vital. We pride ourselves in this country on working on the premise that people are innocent until proved guilty. The current provision seems to go completely against that by stopping payment immediately an allegation is made. I also concur with the hon. Member for Crewe and Nantwich about the need for anonymity as far as is possible.

Kevin Brennan: I shall cut to the chase. I am very sympathetic to the principle of new clause 14. We have to do what we can to reduce the financial impact of an allegation on foster carers, but a better way of achieving that aim, rather than by amending primary legislation, is through the national minimum standards, which we are in the process of reviewing and which will be subject to full public consultation later this year. We intend, therefore, to use the revised national minimum standards to make it clear that fostering service providers who usually pay their foster carers a fee should continue to do so while an allegation is investigated, at the same level as it would have been paid at had the child or children not been removed from the placement. Payments would continue until the allegation had been resolved. I hope that that announcement is helpful to all hon. Members who spoke on the new clause and put their names to it, and to the Fostering Network.
New clause 40 also deals with payments to foster carers who are subject to an allegation, but it concerns the allowance that is paid to foster carers, rather than the fee. This new clause would require local authorities to continue paying the allowance to foster carers who were the subject of a complaint until a decision on the complaint had been reached. Unlike the fee, which is intended to reward the foster carer for their skills, experience and commitment, the allowance is intended to meet the cost of caring for the child. Therefore, it would not be appropriate for us to insist that the allowance be paid if the foster child or children had been removed while the allegation was investigated. In certain cases, the local authority or other provider might want to consider continuing to pay at least an element or perhaps all of the allowance if there are special circumstances, but that is best determined locally where all the facts are known. There is certainly no legislative barrier to providers continuing to pay an allowance if that is appropriate in the circumstances.
New clause 40 would also require local authorities to take steps to protect the identity of foster carers who are the subject of a complaint. Rather than lay out all of the provisions that we have in place, it may be useful if I write to Committee members to outline the details of the foster carers right to confidentially. We accept the principle that foster carers’ identities should not be released in most cases and, where appropriate, should be protected while an allegation is being investigated.
The “Working Together to Safeguard Children” guidance, states that that all complaints should be treated seriously and in accordance with consistent procedures. It also states that it is reasonable to expect 80 per cent. of cases to be resolved within one month, 90 per cent. within three months and all but the most exceptional cases within 12 months—so, 10 per cent. is not an acceptable outcome, as hon. Members have said. Evidence says that those time scales are not always met. During an investigation, the national minimum standards for fostering services, makes it clear that providers should be making independent support available to their foster carers. Again, it appears that that is not happening in all cases.
I am committed to taking further action to address those issues. I recognise that lengthy investigations without adequate independent support can add to the stress experienced by foster carers. So, in addition to our commitment regarding fees, we will be revising the national minimum standards for fostering services to reinforce our expectations about the time scales for resolving investigations and to highlight the need for foster carers who are subject to an allegation to receive appropriate independent support. We will clarify what we mean by that during the revision of those national minimum standards.
I accept the point made by my hon. Friend the Member for Stafford that there are times when allegations have substance, and we should not forget that when trying to deal with the problems that the Fostering Network and hon. Members have rightly highlighted. I hope that hon. Members are reassured by what I have said and that the action that we are taking will improve the situation of foster carers subject to an allegation. I hope that the hon. Member for Crewe and Nantwich will withdraw the motion on that basis.

Edward Timpson: I am grateful to the Minister for that reassurance, and it is reassurance. He is clearly sympathetic and accepts the thrust behind our amendments in principle. It is heartening to see that there is movement with the commitments made under the review of the national minimum standards, particularly on fees. I will read with interest what the Minister provides on anonymity, but, again, I am heartened that he agrees with our position in principle. On that basis, I beg to ask leave to withdraw the motion.

Motion and clause, by leave, withdrawn.

New Clause 16

Medical records of adopted children
‘Local authorities must make provision for the parents of children given for adoption to deposit medical records which may include samples of their DNA as part of the child’s medical record to be made available to the medical practitioner responsible for the child.’.—[Tim Loughton.]

Brought up, and read the First time.

Tim Loughton: I beg to move, That the clause be read a Second time.

Greg Pope: With this it will be convenient to discuss the following: New clause 21—Duty to keep records—
‘(1) It shall be the duty of every local authority and voluntary organisation that looks after or provides accommodation for a child to maintain records prescribed by regulations.
(2) Regulations may provide for the transfer of records held by a voluntary organisation to another voluntary organisation or local authority.’.
New clause 22—Duty to provide access to records—
‘(1) A post-care adult has the right, at his request, to receive from the local authority or voluntary organisation holding his care records:—
(a) all the information relating to his personal history;
(b) all relevant information relating to his family history.
(2) Subsection (1) does not apply to a request for information in circumstances where the local authority or voluntary organisation is authorised by regulations to withhold the information or any part of it.
(3) Regulations may provide for local authorities and voluntary organisations to provide appropriate support, including information and advice, to post-care adults if requested.
(4) The regulations may provide for circumstances in which the local authority or voluntary organisation holding the records may arrange for another local authority or voluntary organisation near the post care adult’s home to provide access to the records and support.
(5) In this section “post care adult” means a person aged 18 and over who has at any time been in the care of, or looked after or accommodated by, a local authority or voluntary organisation.’.

Tim Loughton: I do not wish to delay the Committee for too long. New clause 16 is a probing amendment. I am in sympathy with new clauses 21 and 22 in the name of the hon. Member for Mid-Dorset and North Poole and others. I want to focus on health records. We had a discussion on that and the problems that occur on the Adoption and Children Bill. I am involved with a charity called Cardiac Risk in the Young, which will be holding an annual reception on the Terrace before long. It deals with the tragedy of young people who drop down dead all of a sudden due to a congenital heart defect about which they knew nothing, often relating to problems inherited from parents or defects that could have been detected or been scanned for and dealt with before the fatality happened. As we discussed during the Adoption and Children Bill, there are cases of children who develop a genetic disease later in life, without any knowledge that they may have inherited it from a birth parent with whom they no longer have contact and/or knowledge of.
The purpose of new clauses 21 and 22, which were proposed by BAAF, is to ensure that the lifelong needs of post-care adults are not overlooked during debates on the reform of the care system. It is paramount, when appropriate, that a child who has been through the care system should be able to access the medical records of their birth parents, or that those medical records should be available to the person responsible for caring for that child, so that when the child becomes an adult he or she can refer to them to see whether they mention anything that might prejudice their health later in life.
The idea of a genetic key has been mentioned. For those children who end up in the care system and then go for adoption, there should be a formalised system for keeping their health records and the records of their birth parents safely, so that they can be made available to the children and the children’s health advisers when appropriate. Although it is common sense for that to happen, it does not happen often enough.
When children are pushed from one placement to another, and have unsettled lives, the capacity for medical records to go missing is exacerbated. We know that a large number of children in the care system have not had the basic vaccinations, so their health outcomes are already prejudiced. They do not have access to some of the basic medical preventions that are available to the rest of the population.
The new clauses are probing, to see whether such provisions are necessary and, if it is not already good practice, whether the Government would consider them as a basis for spreading good guidance, so that a directive along those lines could be issued to local authorities.

Annette Brooke: I shall speak to new clauses 21 and 22. I do not disagree with anything said by the hon. Member for East Worthing and Shoreham. The purpose of the clauses are linked. The first is on the duty to keep records. Whatever should be in those records and how it should be transferred would, I assume, be dealt with in regulation. The details and possibly the medical records, too, could be the subject of regulation. The second is on the duty to provide access to records, on which I particularly want to speak.
It is estimated that 350,000 adults in the United Kingdom have spent all or part of their childhood in foster or residential care. The sharing of memories and photographs—all the things that we do with our own families—are not possible for most post-care adults. They may in due course want to make contact with parents and siblings, but that might not be possible. Each year, an estimated 4,000 requests are made by post-care adults for access to files. They do so for many reasons—to rebuild part of their lives, to build self-esteem or because they need to know about their past identity and relationships.
Requests by post-care adults for access to childhood information held in records retained by the local authority come under the Data Protection Act 1998. That Act, however, is not an effective way of meeting the information needs of post-care adults. It imposes restrictions on birth party information, and it does not take account of the plight of post-care adults who want to obtain their family history and details of their parents and siblings.
For many years, rightly so, legislation has been in place to assist adopted people to access support. Today, I am looking for equality of treatment. The same opportunities do not extend to post-care adults, and it could be argued that until they do so those adults will continue to receive a second-rate service, compared with adopted people.

David Kidney: I wanted to intervene to say that I support the new clause, which is why my name appears against it. I do not wish to make a speech. Is not the crux of the matter that there is a legislative framework for adopted children as adults to access their records and learn more about their history, but there is no such framework for adults who were children in care? Those adults have to fall back on the Data Protection Act, which was not meant for that purpose and actually gets in the way.

Annette Brooke: I thank the hon. Gentleman for his intervention. He knows that I am using the BAAF briefing, so he probably anticipated where I was heading. There is an action on access group which is calling for a legislative framework that would enable post-care adults to access information so that they could have a coherent and personal account of their origins and time in care. It also calls for the availability of advice and support that post-care adults can request if they wish, including intermediary services to help to locate and contact family members, and for an audit of statutory and voluntary sector records to be undertaken and published, to enable post-care adults to know where records can be found. Clearly, a lot more needs to be done for that group of people.
I would like to pay tribute to my noble Friend Baroness Barker who has raised the issue on a number of occasions in the other place, most recently during the passage of this Bill. Lord Adonis said that the House of Lords was
“indebted to the noble Baroness, Lady Barker, for raising the critical issue of how best to ensure proper access to information and related services, not only by those who have been adopted but by those who have been in care.”—[Official Report, House of Lords, 14 June 2005; Vol. 672, c. 1189.]
Therefore the consideration today is: “It is a critical issue, but can it be addressed please?”
I constantly come across explanations of how there is already an appropriate strategy framework in place to enable post-care adults to access their case records, and that there are already arrangements for the placement of children, and general regulations and data protection legislation. However, I am told by those with practical experience that the provisions are not working. They do not address the particular circumstances of post-care adults, and are simply inadequate. I will not go on at length about that inadequacy—I want the Minister to go further than what already exists to address the point that the provisions are inadequate, and to tell us what can be done to improve the situation. The important point is that we need the legislative framework for adults who were looked-after children. It is really important to progress that.

Kevin Brennan: I will do my very best to satisfy as many people as I can before the bell tolls.
On new clause 16, we agree that where a child is adopted it is important for their GP to have full and accurate medical information in order to meet that child’s health needs. It is equally important that local authorities have full and accurate medical information about a child where adoption is the plan, and that the child’s adoptive parents are also given that information. That provision already exists in regulations, and I will not go through the regulations now because I seek to keep the Committee happy. However, I shall write to everybody and set out—perhaps in full—what those regulations are and why I think that they are satisfactory. There is nothing to prevent birth parents from approaching the local authority and asking it to pass on new medical information to the child’s adoptive parents and GP. There should be a balance between the interests of the child, and the privacy of birth parents and the confidentiality of medical records. That is a difficult balance to strike. However, local authorities are required to record detailed information about a child’s health and medical history, and must arrange for regular assessments of the child’s health and take health matters into account in regular reviews of the child’s case.
New clauses 21 and 22 relate to looked-after children. Looked-after children are not covered by the support and assistance under the Adoption and Children Act 2002. The hon. Lady mentioned intermediary services which was my own addition to that Act. I accept that formerly looked-after children do not have access to the same services, but there are important distinctions between the two groups. Looked-after children did not change their name or identity. The overwhelming majority returned to their families during the course of their childhoods. That is a vital distinction.
Most children do not typically spend a significant period of time being looked after before a permanent arrangement for their care is made either with a parent, another family member or an adoptive parent. These two new clauses are not necessary because the appropriate statutory framework exists. I shall not set out again what that is. The hon. Lady is familiar with it and I will again write to members of the Committee with the full details of the regulations that I am talking about.
There will be individual adults who are trying to piece together information about their time in the care system from a long time ago. Although the Data Protection Act provides for access to personal information, if records are incomplete then, sadly, no new legislative provision would be able to conjure up non-existent records. Record-keeping is now much more consistent. The guidance is clearer than it has been in previous decades. The Children Act 1989 sets a better framework than previously existed. The integrated children’s system and the detailed resources being produced to support it aim to improve record keeping still further.
While I do not agree with the hon. Lady that we need primary legislation, we recognise that practice varies. Existing guidance already highlights the need for local authorities to handle these issues sensitively and provide appropriate support. In the planned revision of the statutory guidance to the Children Act there is an opportunity to update the existing guidance to local authorities and to ensure that the current best practice is promoted more widely. I will seek to do that.

David Kidney: The briefing from BAAF, to which the hon. Member for Mid-Dorset and North Poole referred, anticipates that the Minister will say that the guidance is adequate, so there is no need for primary legislation. Does he not understand that BAAF, Barnardo’s, the Care Leavers Association, the Catholic Children’s Society, the Children’s Society, the National Children’s Bureau, the National Leaving Care Advisory Service, the NCH, the Post Care Forum, Voice and the Who Cares? Trust all say that the present legislative framework is out of date and inadequate? It has been overtaken by the Data Protection Act 1998 and that gets in the way of people having access to records that are relevant to their own identity.

Kevin Brennan: I realise that I am outnumbered. I take the hon. Gentleman’s point very seriously and I will look carefully at what they have to say. But I also give an undertaking that during the planned revision of the Children Act statutory guidance we will look at updating the existing guidance for local authorities and we will try to ensure that current best practice is promoted. On that basis, I hope that hon. Members will not press these new clauses.

Tim Loughton: I am grateful for that response. We have had an interesting debate. I am particularly pleased that the Minister has undertaken to write to us with further details. I moved my last new clause and I am equally delighted to withdraw it. I beg to ask leave to withdraw the motion.

Motion and clause, by leave, withdrawn.

New Clause 20

Duty to consider children’s views in service improvement
‘After section 22 of the 1989 Act insert—
“22H Children’s views in service improvement
(1) Each local authority shall establish a Children in Care Council or other collective mechanism to ascertain the views of children they are looking after about the services these children are receiving.
(2) Regulations shall prescribe the functions, composition, powers and resources of the Children in Care Council or other mechanism.
(3) The director of the children’s services and lead member for children’s services shall give due consideration to the views expressed by the members of the Children in Care Council or other collective mechanism.
(4) The director of children’s services and lead member for children’s services shall report annually to the Children in Care Council or other mechanism on the steps they have taken in response to the views expressed by its members.”’.—[Annette Brooke.]

Brought up, and read the First time.

Annette Brooke: I beg to move, That the clause be read a Second time.
This is about the participation of looked-after children. I do not want to undermine the great strides forward that have been made generally in terms of taking on board children and young people’s views and listening to them. But it is vital that we make sure that children’s views are fully taken on board in service improvement. The new clause calls for each local authority to establish a children in care council or other collective mechanism to ascertain the views of the children they are looking after about the services they are receiving.
We must acknowledge that it is not prescriptive to say that every local authority shall have a children in care council. There are obviously other ways of accessing children’s views. It may not be appropriate for a very small authority to have a children in care council. However, there should be a collective mechanism to bring children and young people together to engage in debate on a fairly regular basis, not just once a year. That would enable them to have a dialogue with the lead member of the council and the director of children’s services.
The purpose of the new clause is to place a duty on local authorities to provide a collective mechanism for children in their care. It would obviously be helpful for the director of children’s services and the lead member for children’s services to be able to give due consideration to the views of such groups, to report on their responses and to give action to the views expressed.
I was honoured and privileged, along with the hon. Member for Crewe and Nantwich, to attend the all-party parliamentary group on adoption and fostering yesterday. I met a virtual head teacher for the first time. I was looking forward to that moment and it was impressive to hear him talk about his work in the local authority where he is effectively head teacher for 500 looked-after children. In any school situation, it would be good to have a school council among a group of 500 children. With all of the good work going on with the virtual head teacher, it would be superb to have a children in care council. I can see that it would really work with those sorts of numbers.
Following that meeting, I am even more inspired about this idea. I am very keen on school councils and like to promote them when I go round schools. Now that we have virtual head teachers, I do not see why a virtual head teacher should not be empowered, or have a duty, to set up a council.
Lord Adonis claimed in the House of Lords that it was unnecessary to legislate for children in care councils because we have existing regulations for children in care to be consulted about service provision. My briefing points out that what is in existence is only an annual one-off event for the children and young people’s panel. A children in care council would be ongoing with continuous participation and existing ideas could be built upon. Consultations are narrowed by specific questions, where as a children in care council would be pretty open-ended. The views of children in care would be heard directly by the people who are vital to the provision of services: the director and the lead member.
Most of all, this proposal focuses on the specific views and experiences of children in care. Throughout the Bill we have made the point that we must keep focusing on the particular needs of children in care. I emphasise that I am not suggesting that the new clause should result in a children in care council for every local authority. I can see that there would be variations. However, I think that it would be excellent to have a commitment in the Bill to listening to the views of looked-after children.
The new clause is compatible with article 12 of the convention on the rights of the child. It would bring out debates on local needs and it could spread accountability to children in care. How often do we hear young people say, “Well I said such and such, but it did not make any difference.”? Regular interactive meetings with young people would enable them to follow something through. They would be able to find out why good ideas that they had raised had not been implemented. They would be able to find out the reasons and chase people up to get on with the job. I commend the new clause to the Committee for serious consideration.

Kevin Brennan: I, too, met the virtual head teachers when they came into the Department and virtually all of them turned up on that occasion. It was interesting to hear about the progress on the pilots, which are an important initiative. I can assure the hon. Lady that I agree with everything she said, except for the need for the new clause. We are deeply committed to ensuring that looked-after children and care leavers who are entitled to leaving care services are properly consulted on the services they receive and involved in helping to shape and improve them. That is why we made the commitment, as she knows, in the “Care Matters” White Paper to introduce children in care councils in every local authority.
We are embedding that commitment by spelling out in statutory guidance our expectation that every local authority should have a children in care council or an equivalent structure to ensure that looked-after children and young people are able to put their experiences of the care system directly to those responsible for service delivery, and I recently met some young people in south Gloucestershire who are doing exactly that. We will ask Ofsted to report on those participation arrangements as part of the planned inspection programme focusing on children in care, and that will begin in 2009. The new clause is unnecessary because the reforms that it seeks to legislate for are already underway.

Annette Brooke: I hope that I shall still be in Parliament to check up on that progress. We have been told that so much is in hand, in guidance or that it will happen, so I am rather heartened to hear that there will be a specific inspection on that matter, because it is important that there is a clear way forward to ensure investigations on whether local authorities are following through. During the course of the Committee’s proceedings, we appear to be imposing rather a lot of guidance and regulations on them. I beg to ask leave to withdraw the motion.

Motion and clause, by leave, withdrawn.

New Clause 24

Guardians for children with special protection needs
‘(1) As soon as a child under 18 who is separated from both his parents and is not being cared for by an adult who by law or custom has responsibility to do so makes an asylum claim or human rights claim or is identified as a victim of trafficking, a local authority must ensure that a legal guardian is appointed to represent that child.
(2) The following expressions have the same meaning in this section as they have in Part 5 of the Nationality, Immigration and Asylum Act 2002 (c.41)—
(a) “asylum claim”;
(b) “human rights claim”.
(3) “Trafficking” means the arrangement or facilitation of the arrival in, entry to, travel within, or departure from the United Kingdom for the purposes of exploitation as defined in section 4(4) of the Asylum and Immigration (Treatment of Claimants, etc.) Act 2004 (c.19) (trafficking people for exploitation).’.—[Annette Brooke.]

Brought up, and read the First time.

Annette Brooke: I beg to move, That the clause be read a Second time.
This new clause is very much intended to be probing, although the principle was discussed in the other place. I wish to ascertain the Government’s position on a statutory system of guardianship for all separated children who are subject to immigration control in England and Wales. I want to ensure that the welfare needs of those children are properly safeguarded within the context of the asylum determination process and that their support and care needs are met by all agencies charged with those functions.
Each year, 3,000 children who are separated from both parents and are not being cared for by an adult who by law or custom has responsibility to do so come to the UK and claim asylum. I have a feeling that I might have put the same arguments forward during the passage of the Children Act 2004, as they seem remarkably familiar and there is a sense of dÃ(c)jÃ vu. We also proposed at that time that the Border and Immigration Agency should come under section 11, so I think that it is worth carrying on putting the points forward.
The Bill presents an opportunity to strengthen the protection for children in the care of the state and cover asylum-seeking children and trafficked children, which is a matter of great concern. The new clause does not seek to establish any detailed mechanics on how a system of guardianship would operate, but it is important to recognise that there is no systematic provision of independent oversight on matters involving separated children who are subject to immigration control. Children can go unrepresented in their asylum application and might be placed in inappropriate accommodation with inadequate support. Indeed, they might not understand the implications of their asylum application. In the current system, separated children seeking asylum, some as young as eight years old, have to instruct their own solicitors, yet these children might not be competent to instruct a legal representative. Although there is provision through CAFCASS, which I appreciate, we still need guardianship.
Indeed, my noble friend Baroness Walmsley raised the issue, but I think that the Minister misunderstood what she was saying. Obviously we accept that CAFCASS can be helpful for a small number of non-citizen children going through the family court system, however, there is a gap in provision. A very low number of children is granted asylum. The majority are granted discretionary leave, which means that they need greater protection during the time that they are here, certainly to comply with the European convention on human rights.
We still have the reservation to article 22 of the UN convention on the rights of the child. I was heartened earlier this year when the Minister addressing that issue said that it was being looked at. I am not sure whether we have any information on that matter. I want particularly emphasise trafficked children. Lord Adonis commented in the other place that the Government are considering the changes needed to comply with article 10 of the Council of Europe convention on action against trafficking in human beings, which states that every unaccompanied child identified as a victim will be provided with representation
“by a legal guardian, organisation or authority which shall act in the best interests of that child”.
I would like some more details about that because it is so important. There is cross-party concern for trafficked children.
It is also important to note that the 10th report of the Joint Committee on Human Rights, published March 2007, expressed concern that asylum-seeking children were not getting as much protection as other children. The report recommends
“that a formal system of guardianship should be established for separated children subject to immigration control, including separated asylum seeking children. The guardian would have a statutory role and would be appointed by a statutory body to safeguard the best interests of the child and provide a link between all those providing services and support. The guardian should be expected to intervene if public bodies act in contravention of their legal duties towards a child”
There is a great opportunity to protect further the rights of separated children subject to immigration control. I hope that the Minister will consider favourably something that has been asked for on many occasions. I know the concerns about control of asylum and immigration, but we are talking about children. I believe that child in this country have the same rights to protection as citizens do.

Beverley Hughes: I agree with the hon. Lady that the issue concerns everybody, particularly when we are talking about children who are not only separated from their families but may have been trafficked. I shall say at the outset that the matter was considered in detail in 2004 when we implemented the European Union reception conditions directive, which called for minimum standards on the reception of asylum seekers, including children. Article 19 requires states
“to ensure the necessary representation of unaccompanied”
asylum-seeking child by legal guardians or
“representation by an organisation which is responsible for their care and well-being”
We took the view then, and it is still our view, that the care and support that children receive from local authorities, under the same statutory arrangements as other children in need, mean that the UK is fully compliant with that directive. Therefore, we do not believe that a system of statutory guardianship is necessary, or indeed desirable, to achieve that goal. However, I agree with the hon. Lady that services for unaccompanied asylum-seeking children, particularly those who have been trafficked, need to be improved. The provisions of the Bill, alongside some other measures that I will touch on briefly, will deliver some of the necessary improvements that she seeks.
First, it is important to make the point, in relation to the hon. Lady’s concluding remarks, that we are discussing children. All children should have the same rights under the law. I agree with her. Children’s legislation makes no distinction between children who are separated, unaccompanied asylum-seeking children or other children. The duties under the Children Act 2004 depend simply on the levels of assessed need. They are not affected at all by immigration status or other factors of that nature. As she will know, last year the courts made it absolutely clear in a robust judgment that it is not acceptable for local authorities to make any distinction in service provision on any basis other than assessed need. That was in relation to a case involving unaccompanied asylum-seeking children.
Secondly, the reforms in the Bill and the wider “Care Matters” programme will challenge local authorities to improve their practice. That will benefit unaccompanied asylum-seeking and trafficked children who have grown up in this country. I recognise that the experiences of these children will be distinct in some important respects and that they will require more specialised services and care than the generality of looked-after children.
For that reason, the UK Border Agency has proposed that children should be placed not right across the country, but with a limited number of specialist local authorities so that we can be sure that they receive that specialist level of care and expertise. The training of IROs and social workers in those authorities can be given in relation to the dimensions that the separated and immigration statuses give such children. We will therefore develop some specialist areas of expertise. That fits in with the reforms of the UK Border Agency set out in “Better outcomes: the way forward”, which was about improving the care of unaccompanied asylum-seeking children and was published in January this year. It also fits in with the code of practice, “Keeping children safe from harm”. I think that that is the way to ensure that the special needs of such children are dealt with in practice.
We will also update the statutory guidance to recognise and deal with the particular needs of this group. In revising the Children Act guidance for local authorities, we will reflect the significant increase in the number of these children in the care system since the guidance was originally written in the early 1990s. There will be a real focus on this group in that guidance.
On the other hand, I hope that the hon. Lady accepts that it is not clear what benefits there would be from an extra system of guardianship. This matter reflects the debate on advocates for every child. The reality for most of these children is that they already encounter a long list of individuals, many of them charged in one way or another with representing them, such as their solicitor. They are all referred to the Refugee Council children’s panel, which provides advice and assistance. They have their local authority social worker and the enhanced role of the IRO will apply to them, which we have discussed in this Committee. As I have said, if they are located in specialist authorities where the IRO is given special training in the circumstances and needs of such young people, they will get a better service.
We have had this argument before. I do not think that the legislation needs to be adjusted. I accept that we need to adjust practice and we must spotlight the needs of these children and train people to be better in meeting their needs and recognising the issues that come with their immigration status. However, that is a matter for practice and not for legislation in the Bill. I hope that the hon. Lady accepts that the measures I have outlined will meet her aspirations sufficiently and will therefore withdraw the motion.

Annette Brooke: I thank the Minister for her comprehensive reply. I am still unconvinced, but sometimes one has to beg to differ. I will not press the matter to a vote, but this is an issue that I will continue to raise because I think that we need to go a lot further. I seem to recollect that when the Green Paper was first published, as the Minister will acknowledge, it made little mention of asylum seekers, which always gives the impression that we do not give enough attention to them. We have come quite a way since then but we have not yet reached the best position. I will continue to push for this outside Committee, but I beg to ask leave to withdraw the motion.

Motion and clause, by leave, withdrawn.

New Clause 25

Health assessments and care
‘After section 90 of the 1989 Act insert—
“Health assessments and care
90A Health assessments and care
(1) Where a child is looked after by a local authority, the Primary Care Trust (“PCT”) or, where there is no relevant PCT, the Health Authority or Health Board, must co-operate with the local authority in the provision of physical, emotional and mental health assessments and care.
(2) The Secretary of State shall make regulations providing for physical, emotional and mental health assessments of a child looked after by the local authority.
(3) Regulations made under this section shall make provision about—
(a) the qualifications and experience of an individual undertaking a health assessment;
(b) the length of time after a child starts to be looked after by a local authority by which a health assessment must take place; and
(c) the inclusion of details in the care plan of the arrangements made jointly by the local authority and PCT, or if there is no PCT, the Health Authority or Health Board, for the area in which the child is living for the physical, emotional and mental health care of the child.”’.—[Annette Brooke.]

Brought up, and read the First time.

Annette Brooke: I beg to move, That the clause be read a Second time.
This amendment has also been supported by a number of organisations. I should like to make that clear from the outset. I suspect that I will be given assurances that it is all dealt with already, but the NSPCC, BAAF, Who Cares?, ChildLine and the NCB support this, so I am not alone in thinking that rather more could be done. Ever since the Sexual Offences Bill, I have had a particular interest in seeing that when a child has been sexually abused an assessment is made and therapeutic treatment is available. I have raised this on many occasions. A child who has been abused sometimes goes on to become a perpetrator. We have more and more unhappiness and misery by not addressing the situation at the time when it needs addressing. The availability of therapeutic treatment across this country is very patchy. We could prevent many tragedies if we could ensure that that treatment was available.
The amendment concerns assessment, treatment and support. My particular interest in therapeutic counselling and treatment for sexually abused children will, sadly, form part of that. About 60 per cent. of children are brought into care is because they have been abused in some way, be that physical violence, sexual abuse or other forms. That tells us quite a lot. Children who come into care have at least a 60 per cent. chance of needing some form of treatment. They often need mental health treatment.
Despite the fact that the Government have invested greatly, and I will not underestimate the extra investment, there is still a long way to go until we provide enough services. There can be a long time lag between assessment and treatment. That is critical for this group of vulnerable young people. They have already had a bad start in life. We need to be able to act to do the best that we can to remedy and make good as soon as possible
I therefore call in the new clause for an explicit duty to be placed on PCTs to co-operate with local authorities in the provision of health assessments and care to looked-after children, for assessment to be undertaken by suitably qualified and experienced practitioners and for regulations to set out in detail how joint arrangements for the individual child will be made, recorded and reviewed. I should add that 45 per cent. of looked-after children and young people aged five to 17 are assessed as having an emotional or mental health disorder, compared with 10 per cent. of the general child and young person population. Those are Government figures. Looked-after children and young people exhibit high rates of self-harm and high risk behaviour. Two thirds of looked-after children are reported to have had at least one physical health complaint. Some of those complaints are speech and language problems, and in other arenas we talk a great deal about how much such problems inhibit a child’s development.
The problem is that provision is patchy, as is working together, despite provisions that state that there should be a multidisciplinary approach and that primary care trusts should work closely with local authorities. I shall give an example from my own constituency, where local authority boundaries are not coterminous with primary care trust boundaries. That problem has been overcome with help from the Government for the council concerned. Nevertheless, I have a letter from a health service worker saying:
“It is not my responsibility in West Dorset to provide services for East Dorset children.”
Those east Dorset children have been sent to a specialist school in west Dorset. That problem has now been dealt with, but it has taken a long time and an MP’s intervention. I do not buy the assurances that “it is all happening”. We have a long way to go, and that is why the duty is important.
I have the feeling that everybody is trying to hurry me up. I am doing my best, but these are meaty new clauses. I am sure that Hansard will show that I have not had more than my fair share of time. The new clauses that I am leading on are really important to me and to all our looked-after children, and I do not want to rush through them at the cost of not making a point. I am looking for a number of assurances on how the arrangements will work. Given the intensity of the problems regarding the health of looked-after children, a duty in the Bill is called for.

Beverley Hughes: I will not list for the hon. Lady the various current regulations, because I want to focus on the steps we are taking, which I think will achieve what she wants to achieve in a different but equally effective way. She will be aware of the duty to co-operate in sections 10 and 11 of the Children Act 2004, which applies to a range of health bodies and other agencies. The guidance that flowed from that and the power to issue statutory guidance were not implemented in relation to primary care trusts and health bodies. Guidance was issued to health bodies but it was not statutory—that power was not switched on.
I give the hon. Lady an assurance that we intend to issue new statutory guidance in relation to the powers in sections 10 and 11. The revised guidance will be statutory for primary care trusts, strategic health authorities, NHS foundation trusts and local authorities. It will cover assessments of the physical, emotional and mental health of looked-after children, health plans, the involvement of qualified medical practitioners in assessments and reviews, the time scales for completion of assessments and reviews, health promotion, the provision of child and adolescent mental health services for looked-after children—which the hon. Lady rightly says is important—and the roles and responsibilities of health bodies and local authorities in improving the health of looked-after children. For the first time, the guidance will have the statutory bite that has applied to other agencies under sections 10 and 11 of the 2004 Act.
In addition, we are using some of the architecture of the national health service to build in a focus on looked-after children. The statutory guidance will be complemented by the new joint strategic needs assessment, the new NHS operating framework for 2008-09, and the national indicator set for local government. For the first time, the NHS operating framework includes keeping children well, improving overall health and reducing health inequalities as one of the top five priorities for the NHS. That marks the beginning of a new chapter in the journey of the NHS to a focus on more preventive services for children and young people.
Let me explain how we will monitor that. In addition to our existing data collection, there is a new indicator on the emotional health of looked-after children. That will be particularly important in driving up the supply of CAMH services. Under the children’s plan, we asked Jo Davidson, the director of children’s services for Gloucester, to undertake a review of CAMH services. The call for evidence closes tomorrow, I think, and Jo Davidson will report in the autumn on what more needs to be done in that regard.

Annette Brooke: Can the Minister give a time scale for publication and implementation of the revised guidance? I am talking about the statutory position. When will that happen?

Beverley Hughes: It is part of our process of either revising existing guidance or, in this case, introducing revised guidance with a new status. I do not have information on the specific time with me, but I might be able to get that if I keep talking long enough-albeit without wishing to delay the Committee. Otherwise, I can write to the hon. Lady. I am not clear on where it is in our list of work to be done on guidance, but I can tell her that it will be published before the end of this year—in 2008. With that, I hope that the hon. Lady feels that the points she made have been covered and she will withdraw the motion.

Annette Brooke: Again, the test will be in the monitoring to see what difference statutory guidance makes and whether we will need to return to the matter at a later date. I would just like to leave the Minister with a thought about the availability of therapeutic treatment across the country. There has been a long-term campaign on that by the NSPCC—I am an ambassador for the NSPCC, so I ought to declare that interest. I know that not having therapeutic treatment escalates problems and leads to further incidents in society. I thank the Minister for the fact that we have the statutory guidance. I hope that that will result in change, but I feel that we have a long way to go and we may well have to revisit this issue. I beg to ask leave to withdraw the motion.

Motion and clause, by leave, withdrawn.

New Clause 28

Limitation period
‘In seeking to bring a claim for damages in relation to any injury sustained during any period in which C was a looked after child, the limitation period for bringing such a claim shall be—
(a) three years from the date of becoming 18 years of age;
(b) three years starting from the date he discovers, or ought reasonably to discover, that he has a legal claim; or
(c) 10 years from the date of the act or omission which gives rise to the claim,
whichever is the latest.’.—[Mr. Kidney.]

Brought up, and read the First time.

David Kidney: I beg to move, That the clause be read a Second time.
Limitation periods provide cut-offs on people’s ability to bring cases to court. There are limitation periods in criminal courts and civil courts. There are different limitation periods for different behaviours and there are different rules about disapplying limitation periods and extending them. The Law Commission was asked to examine the state of the law in 2001 and concluded that the law was needlessly complex, outdated and, in some respects, unfair. It gave as an example of complexity and unfairness sexual abuse cases. Unfortunately, many sexual abuse cases that have come to the public’s attention over the years have related to children who were abused in public care. They are particularly powerful cases, because the public feel that very vulnerable children, whose protection the public were charged with, have been let down a second time. We are seeing that all over again at the moment in the cases being investigated in Jersey.
The Law Commission said that the law should be reformed, and in 2002 the Government said that that was a good idea and they would do that, but still there has been no reform. Several hon. Members, myself included, have been asking parliamentary questions about the Government’s intentions. Last year—2007—the Government told me in written answers that they would start to reform the law at the beginning of 2008. When I asked a written question at the beginning of 2008, they said that they had not got round to it yet and they might do so later in the year. Now we are in the second half of the year and still there is nothing.
It might be fun for me to criticise the Government for being slower than they said they would be, but it is now several years since they said that they would amend a law that has been shown by the Law Commission to be complex and unfair. Still there are cases of people who have been deprived, by a limitation period, of the ability to bring a claim for compensation for sexual abuse sustained when they were in public care. Potentially, other people will suffer in future years until we amend the law. I am therefore trying to provoke a debate through new clause 28, at least in respect of children in care—I recognise that limitation periods apply much more widely than simply to this group of people and this type of case—to see whether the Minister can tell me whether the Government will finally make some progress.

Kevin Brennan: There are three reasons why I am resisting my hon. Friend’s new clause. I hope that I can also say something at the end on his final point.
First, the current law contained in the Limitation Act 1980, as interpreted by the recent House of Lords ruling in A v. Hoare, already achieves much of what the new clause is designed to achieve. Indeed, the current law is in many ways more generous to claimants. I will write to all members of the Committee to outline my reasons for saying that—

Sitting suspended for Divisions in the House.

On resuming—

Kevin Brennan: I was on the first of the 47 points—I correct myself, three points—that I was going to make in response to the new clause tabled by my hon. Friend the Member for Stafford.
My first point was that the current law is more generous to claimants than the new clause would be in practice. I said that I would write to my hon. Friend and Committee members to outline why that would be the case.
Secondly, there is no need to create a special limitation category for looked-after children. My hon. Friend acknowledged that in his remarks, and I shall be happy to elucidate in my letter.
Thirdly, any reform of the law of limitation in this area should be undertaken as part of a wider exercise addressing the whole topic. I sensed from my hon. Friend’s comments that in tabling the new clause, he was trying to stimulate action by the Government on the reform of the law of limitation. I can confirm that it has taken longer than expected for the Government to issue the consultation in this area. However, it will be issued as soon as possible—hopefully, in the near future. If it is deemed to be appropriate, based on the consultation, the Government will consider legislating in this area. On that basis, I ask him to consider withdrawing the motion.

David Kidney: There are some inadequacies in the drafting of the new clause so I will not press it to a vote. As the Minister says, the issue is not simply limitation periods as they apply to former children in care; a wide range of cases are affected. Some hon. Members will recall that there is a lot of interest in this matter in relation to health and safety at work cases for people who develop conditions such as mesothelioma many years after they have finished work. There are questions about when the limitation period stops them from making claims against employers arising from events that happened many years back.
There is a need to review the law in this entire area, as the Government said it would in 2002. If we have helped to speed things along a little by making this proposal and by the Minister making inquiries of the Ministry of Justice about where it is with its proposals, we will have done some good. I would like to stress to the Committee that in my capacity as chairman of the associate parliamentary group on looked-after children and care leavers, I still come across dreadful cases of people who have suffered atrociously, first by going into care, secondly by being sexually abused when in care, and thirdly by their experience of the legal system, because they could not make a claim for compensation when they finally realised that a claim was possible.
This is an urgent and pressing matter and I hope that the Minister will write not only to me and members of the Committee, but to the Ministry of Justice to hurry it along. I beg to ask leave to withdraw the motion.

Motion and clause, by leave, withdrawn.

New Clause 31

Duty to assess provision of independent advocacy services
‘(1) A local authority must prepare assessments of the sufficiency of the provision of independent advocacy services (whether or not by them) for looked after children for whom they are responsible (“advocacy assessments”).
(2) The first advocacy assessment must be prepared before the end of the period of one year beginning at the commencement of this section.
(3) Subsequent advocacy assessments must be prepared at intervals not exceeding three years.
(4) The local authority must keep an advocacy assessment under review until the independent advocacy assessment is superseded by a further advocacy assessment.
(5) Regulations may make provision requiring an advocacy assessment—
(a) to deal with prescribed matters or be prepared according to prescribed criteria;
(b) to be in the prescribed form;
(c) to be published in the prescribed manner and in a manner that can be understood by children.
(6) In preparing an advocacy assessment and keeping it under review, a local authority must—
(a) consult such persons, or persons of such a description, as may be prescribed including looked after children and those who provide independent advocacy services;
(b) have regard to any guidance given from time to time by the Secretary of State.’.—[Mr. Kidney.]

Brought up, and read the First time.

David Kidney: I beg to move, That the clause be read a Second time.

Greg Pope: With this it will be convenient to discuss new clause 32—Access to advocacy services—
‘In section 26A of the 1989 Act (Advocacy services), after subsection (5) insert—
“(5A) Every local authority shall make a report on access to advocacy services in their local area annually to the Secretary of State.”’.

David Kidney: I shall be brief, because we debated advocacy fully in a previous sitting and we all agreed that advocacy in the right place is a good thing and part of a good-quality service for all children in care. Perhaps some of us on the Committee were more enthusiastic about the range and rate at which advocacy should be available to children in care, and perhaps the Ministers were not quite so keen; nevertheless, we all agreed.
There is a need to improve access to advocacy, so the new clause would require local authorities to make assessments to show that they have an adequate supply of advocates in their area and to keep that assessment under review and up to date. My hon. Friend the Member for Warrington, South has linked that with new clause 32, which is about local authorities providing a report on access to those services.

Helen Southworth: I hope that my hon. Friend accepts that new clause 32 is far more modest than new clause 31, and in fact encapsulates the drivers that would require new clause 31. Although it is brief and modest, it represents the least the Government can do to ensure that advocacy services are available.

David Kidney: I will not allow my hon. Friend to undersell new clause 32, as it makes an excellent companion to new clause 31. Together, they would ensure that local authorities had at the forefront of their mind the need for adequate provision of advocacy services for all the children for whom they are responsible.

Beverley Hughes: I am grateful that my hon. Friend the Member for Stafford acknowledged the important debate that we had on Tuesday, during which I set out our view on advocacy in the context of clause 11 and made it clear that listening to children is crucial to improving outcomes for them, both individually and in relation to the system as a whole, and to improving system-wide standards. New clauses 31 and 32 pick up on the related issue of how local authorities contract and make arrangements for advocacy provision, and how they should be making effective provision for those services.
I can tell both my hon. Friends that we already require local authorities to monitor their services by keeping a record of each representation received, its outcome and whether there was compliance with the time limits set out in regulations. They are also required to compile a report at the end of each financial year on the operation of their complaints and representations procedure. However, I intend to go further and through statutory guidance require local authorities as part of that report to review their advocacy services annually, to ensure compliance with national standards. We will set out that that will necessarily involve local authority staff seeking regular feedback from children about their experiences of the service.
In revising that guidance and including that provision, we will of course consult widely. We have no doubt that the expertise of third sector advocacy services and the charities represented on the National Children’s Advocacy Consortium will make an invaluable contribution to ensuring that we get that guidance right and that it takes into account good practice on how all children should be listened to, including those who are hard to reach, such as those who require additional communication assistance or help from translation services so that local authorities can ensure that their views are heard. I do not want to require local authorities to publish a separate assessment of advocacy, but I think that extending the statutory guidance in the way that I have outlined will cover the issues that my hon. Friends are concerned about.
I will include another provision: the general quality of advocacy services that we get from those reports and from elsewhere will be included as an item in the annual ministerial stock-take of services to looked-after children that we committed in the White Paper to having every year. Moreover, when Ofsted inspects local authority services for looked-after children, as it will do regularly in a thematic review, it will take into account how local authorities, as corporate parents, are listening to children’s voices and providing for the advocacy service to enable complaints or representations to be made.
I hope that that with those three additional levers in the system, my hon. Friend will accept that we are strengthening the way in which local authorities will have to monitor the quality of their advocacy services, show compliance and take steps to improve them if that is necessary. I hope that those assurances are sufficient to persuade my hon. Friend not to press the new clause.

David Kidney: My right hon. Friend has made three excellent announcements. I am grateful to her for all of them. They are very welcome. I am sure that with an annual review of these services, consultation with young people and their families and carers and the stock-take that she has described, we will see an overall improvement in the performance of local authorities in commissioning good-quality advocacy services from, among others, the kind of organisations that we have been talking about for the past two weeks, such as NCH and A National Voice, which are great organisations for providing these services. With the initiatives that my right hon. Friend has just announced, I am sure that new clause 31 is not necessary. I beg to ask leave to withdraw the motion.

Motion and clause, by leave, withdrawn.

New Clause 36

Care of young persons up to age 21
‘After section 22G of the 1989 Act (which is inserted by section 10) insert—
“22H General duty of local authority in respect of former relevant children
(1) It is the duty of a local authority to provide accommodation for persons who are—
(a) “former relevant children” within the meaning of section 23C(1) and who have not attained the aged of 22, and
(b) “relevant children” within the meaning of section 23A(2).
(2) Section 22G shall apply in relation to the persons mentioned in subsection (1) as it applies in relation to the children mentioned in subsection (3) of that section.”’.—[Helen Southworth.]

Brought up, and read the First time.

Helen Southworth: I beg to move, That the clause be read a Second time.
I am conscious that I bring with me the admirable support of not only my hon. Friends the Members for Stafford and for Stourbridge, but the 198 Members who signed early-day motion 1413, “Support for young people in care in transition to adult life”, which I tabled. It notes that many young people in care are moved into independent living at 16 or 17, when the average age at which young people in the United Kingdom leave home is 24. In practice that means that many vulnerable young people do not receive sufficient support to enable them to make the transition into adult life successfully. It calls on the Government to take steps to ensure that all these vulnerable young people have access to effective support including, where appropriate, the opportunity to remain with their foster carers until they are 21.
The reason why so many hon. Members believe it is essential that the opportunity of this Bill is seized to ensure that there is effective support for young people who are making steps into independent living from care is that the Bill is intended to enable those who enter the care system to achieve the aspirations parents have for their own children, and to reduce the gap in outcomes between children in care and their peers.
The Bill sets out many excellent measures to revolutionise care for children who are looked after by local authorities, but there remains a huge gap between the aspirations within the Bill and the practice for young people who, from the age of 16, are moving into independent living. There is a particular issue for young people who at the age of 16 or 17 move from foster care or from a local authority or private children’s home into other accommodation. The current practice in operation in many, if not most, parts of the country is that when young people leave the care of the local authority and leave the protection of the “parent”, they are left alone to resolve their problems themselves because they have moved accommodation.
Although the Ministers have made it clear in the Bill that they have admirable aspirations to ensure that local authorities provide accommodation for young people in their care, the practical fact remains that many young people of 16 or 17 are at best encouraged, and in some cases left with no alternative other than, to leave care and move into the supported services available through local authority housing services, rather than through children’s services.
I draw the Committee’s attention to the children’s rights director’s report of February 2006, “Young People’s Views on Leaving Care”, in which Dr. Roger Morgan made it clear that the consultation that he undertook demonstrated that this is an issue of serious concern to young people. In his top 10 list of things that most worry young people about leaving care, drawn up by consulting young people, among the problems such as loneliness and not being able to cope that hon. Members have already mentioned is the serious problem of:
“Leaving before being ready to do so—‘Should have a say in when to leave care’”.
Other concerns are:
“Having nowhere/no-one to come back to”; “Being put in some ‘dodgy’ places... Becoming homeless”,
and
“‘Not being able to settle anywhere’—having to keep moving around”.
The report demonstrated that young people are leaving care at significantly younger ages, typically around 16 or 17 years old. For them, the reality of leaving care is “harsh and uncertain”. The report said:
“A common theme amongst those young people consulted was in their having remarkably short periods of notice to leave, together with their sheer lack of preparation to do so”.
It went on:
“One young woman told us she had received no notice of having to leave care, had no plans drawn up prior to leaving and did not have any form of written plan.”
It is a sad fact that that young woman is not the only one. Hon. Members in the Committee and outside have received considerable evidence from young people leaving care that they have not had proper support and that they have been put into dodgy places. In some cases, they have been put in hostels where the majority of other residents are people who are leaving prison or have convictions for drug offences or prostitution. These vulnerable young people are being left to cope alone in that sort of accommodation.
I accept that provisions are made in clause 9 for other placements, but there is no way of measuring by inspection the suitability of those other places. It should not be beyond the wit of this House to produce a reasonable checklist that says what is suitable accommodation and what is dodgy. If 16-year-olds can work it out for themselves, we ought to be able to work it out on their behalf. We have a duty to do so.
The aspirations stated in the new clause refer not only to relevant children, but to young people who have previously been relevant up to the age of 21. That is an important thing to write into the Bill. Much legislation over the past few years has demonstrated the right of a looked-after child to be protected up to the age of 18 if it is needed. We have seen that 41 or 42 per cent. of young people have left looked-after status to go into independent living before the age of 18. In many cases, they have gone into wholly unacceptable accommodation. It is unsurprising that they do not have the opportunities that any parent would want for their child in such circumstances.
Many hon. Members want to see the aspiration of the opportunity for a young person to make a proper transition into independent living written into the Bill. We would then not have to look at opportunities that might emerge from future pilots. We already know that, for many young people, the opportunities to carry on in further education, higher education, training or work all depend on having a safe place to live and somebody they can turn to and talk things through with.
Finally and briefly, I would ask that we please focus on this problem, because it is something that many Members of this House expect us to address, either in this Committee or elsewhere.

Kevin Brennan: I thank my hon. Friend for her work and my other hon. Friends who have campaigned very assiduously on this issue. Unfortunately, her new clause is technically defective, because unless an appropriate consequential amendment is made to make an exclusion from the definition of a child who is looked after in section 22 of the 1989 Act, it would have the effect of making all relevant children looked after. Notwithstanding that, I think that she wants me to talk a little about these issues.

Helen Southworth: On that point about technical drafting, I am sure that the Minister will be very well aware that he has far greater resources at his command than his hon. Friends have available to them. Will he meet with us to discuss the detail of drafting, so that we can have a better new clause?

Kevin Brennan: I am always pleased to meet my hon. Friend, although I was going on to give the other reasons why we do not need the new clause and, of course, there was no implied criticism of her at all in relation to the point that I was making about the technical drafting of the new clause.

Tim Loughton: The Minister did not say that to me.

Kevin Brennan: In the case of the hon. Gentleman, although I extend my sympathy to him for having been in the same job for the past seven years, I had thought that, by now, he would have learned how to draft an amendment or new clause in the correct manner.
Our three priorities are: making sure that children do not have to leave care before they are ready to do so; making sure that all care leavers have access to an appropriate range of accommodation options when they leave care, and providing the right support for care leavers so that they can make a successful transition to independent living.
The Committee will be glad to hear that I will not go through all the measures that we have discussed and are introducing, both in the “Care Matters” implementation plan and in the Bill, in relation to young people leaving care and accommodation. There are a number of measures that should have a significant impact in reducing the numbers of relevant children who need accommodation. Clause 9 will ensure that there is thorough scrutiny whenever a local authority plans to move a child to move from a placement with foster parents or in a children’s home to any other arrangement, which is likely to be accommodation that is less supported, whether that is a hostel or supported lodgings.
As we have already discussed in our consideration of the Bill, we would expect the IRO to provide a robust challenge to such a proposed change to the placement arrangement if there is any doubt about the young person’s informed consent to the move, or any doubt that such a move is not in their interest. We are committed to using existing regulatory powers to introduce a new requirement for personal advisers to visit young people where they are living, mirroring the new visiting duty for looked-after children in clause 16, to reduce still further the practical differences between the services that local authorities must provide for looked-after children and relevant children, including the financial incentives that local authorities may have had previously to force children out of care before they are ready. We want to stop there being any incentive at all for local authorities to do that, and to ensure that they absolutely understand what their duties are. Obviously that has been a large part of the discussions that we have had in relation to the Bill and to the wider “Care Matters” implementation plan.
As part of our revision of the Children Act guidance, we will be issuing statutory guidance to IROs in 2009. The focus of case reviews should be the provision made by the local authority to meet the full range of the child’s needs. For relevant children placed in unregulated placements, such as supported lodgings, hostels, or, as is sometimes the case, their own independent accommodation, it is essential that the review examines whether or not their accommodation is suitable and whether or not they are being provided with all the support that they need.
If that review process identifies problems, then the review meeting provides the opportunity to find the appropriate solutions. That will require that leaving care services establish real partnerships with housing and youth homelessness services. Housing services and children’s services must adopt a shared strategic approach to the provision of housing and support pathways for young people. That was the strong message in the guidance, “Joint working between Housing and Children’s Services: Preventing homelessness” published by my Department and the Department for Communities and Local Government in May this year.
When I visited South Gloucestershire a few months ago, I met a young person in care and what one young lady said about what her brother had said years before was interesting. She said that her brother had said that being in care meant “homelessness”. Ultimately, that was what it meant to him and his friends; we are determined to bring that to an end. I and hon. Members have seen how that situation can be transformed, and we need to ensure that that is happening more widely around the country. We are committed to supporting young people in their transition into adulthood. I know that my hon. Friend the Member for Warrington, South will be holding us to account as we try to strength the guidelines. Her new cause is unnecessary and has technical deficiencies, and I hope that she will agree to withdraw it.

Helen Southworth: We have already commented on the technical difficulties within the amendment. I hope that my hon. Friend will agree to meet Members to look at the issues further. In light of the indications that we have received from the Minister and of the time that we have available to us over then next few months before Report, I will review what he as said. However, first I shall remind him that in the Joseph Rowntree Foundation’s 2005 report, “Life after care”, 36 per cent. of young people reported being homeless at some time in the year after leaving care and that Rainer’s “Home alone” report found that almost one in six of care leavers were in unsuitable accommodation, with a number in unsafe accommodation. We urgently need to demonstrate that the Bill as drafted is capable of delivering what it needs to for young people up to the age of 21 to ensure that they can make an effective transition into independent living. On that basis I will withdraw the amendment, but 198 Members want to see the Bill working effectively. I beg to ask leave to withdraw the motion.

Motion and clause, by leave, withdrawn.

Question proposed, That the Chairman do report the Bill, as amended, to the House.

Kevin Brennan: On a point of order, Mr. Pope.

Greg Pope: Order. The motion that the Chairman do report the Bill to the House is itself debatable.

Kevin Brennan: I obviously learnt nothing in my two years in the Government Whips Office. I am a rather defective Minister. I thank you, Mr. Pope, and your colleague, Mr. Williams, for chairing the Committee. I apologise that perhaps his presence meant that some of us, including the hon. Member for Upminster, occasionally lapsed into the language of heaven and I particularly apologise to the Hansard writers for that. I hope that the Committee will agree that we, including the hon. Member for Ceredigion, made a valiant effort to pronounce the very difficult English constituency names of colleagues correctly during the proceedings. I also thank the officials, the Clerks, the Hansard writers, the Doorkeepers and the police for their assistance during our deliberations.
We have had an extremely useful Committee stage. The Bill has been altered, if not through direct amendment, by indications that my right hon. Friend and I have given either about strengthening regulation or about amendments to other legislation about which hon. Members have raised important points. The Committee has had a right and proper scrutiny process, which has improved the Bill. I would like to thank all Committee members, particularly my right hon. Friend the. Member for Stretford and Urmston and my hon. Friend the Member for Worcester, who, being in the Whips Office and not being allowed to speak, does not get enough recognition. He has helped us to get through all the clauses in time, as we have this afternoon.
I would also like to thank Members of the Opposition parties and particularly their spokespersons, both of whom I have debated with before. I thank the hon. Member for Mid-Dorset and North Poole for her elegant choice of clauses and amendments to support. The hon. Member for East Worthing and Shoreham said that he did not come into politics to be elegant. I wrote that down when he said it. You may have noticed at that point, Mr. Pope, one or two titters on this side of the Committee, because as the hon. Gentleman was saying that some of my hon. Friends behind me were passing around a copy of a new magazine called “Total Politics”. In that magazine there is an article on political elegance, with a quote, which is highlighted:
“And wear braces only if you want to look like a twit.”
Heaven forefend that the hon. Gentleman should think that I am getting at him. That is a quote from his hon. Friend the Member for Rutland and Melton (Alan Duncan). He made that contribution to an article entitled “Dress to the Right, Sir?” I hope that the hon. Gentleman will forgive me for pointing that out to the Committee, but it was he who said that he did not want to be elegant. That is just as well, considering his hon. Friend’s comments. With that, I would like to conclude, and to thank you once again, Mr. Pope, for your chairmanship.

Tim Loughton: Further to that non-point of order, Mr. Pope, I also add my thanks to you and Mr. Williams for your unassuming, understanding and accommodating chairmanship, which has allowed us perhaps to range slightly more freely through some of the clauses. May I also thank—I was going to thank the Minister but I am not entirely sure that I should now. One would look even more of a twit if one was not wearing braces and one’s trousers ended up around one’s ankles. That is another matter, which I shall take up with my sort of hon. Friend the Member for Rutland and Melton later in the Lobby.
We have had a constructive debate on a universally welcomed Bill, which has been improved by the debate in another place and by the undertakings and discussions in this Committee. We have had some disappointments and some anticlimaxes, although not quite of the ejaculatory nature that the Minister suggested earlier. I also thank my hon. Friends. It is always worthwhile being on a Committee where just about every member contributes. In the past, there were times when like muppets they sat there and, under strict instructions, said nothing. There are some regular suspects—if I can put it that way—on the Committee who have been very involved in children’s legislation for many years, for almost as long as I have, and they made valid contributions born out of their great experience.
I give my thanks to my hon. Friend the Member for Isle of Wight. It was good to see him back in Committee, making his first contribution since his recent health problems. I also give my thanks to our Whip, my hon. Friend the Member for Upminster. It is always good to have a talking Whip—try stopping her, with her knowledge of this subject. I thank my hon. Friend the Member for Bromsgrove who has been with us on children’s legislation before, and particularly my new hon. Friend the Member for Crewe and Nantwich, who is no longer a Committee virgin which is always a good hurdle to get over.
It was almost frustrating that it was hard to find something to vote on—but we did. However, on Report we might find more reasons to vote. There is some time now for the Government to reflect on many of the suggestions that were made in the Committee. They have undertaken to look again at certain things. They have undertaken to reflect on some of the debates that we have had on the guidance that will be issued with this and accompanying legislation. I therefore look forward to returning on Report, when we might have further progress to report towards ensuring that the Bill is as good as we could possibly hope for, to at last address the problems of some of the most vulnerable people in our society, namely children in care. They have had a lousy deal for some time, and I think that we all agree that the time has finally come to give them the deal—the support and services—that they so much deserve.

Annette Brooke: I would also like to add my thanks, particularly to you, Mr. Pope, in the Chair. It has been obvious that you are very interested in the material, and that has given an added dimension. I thank Mr. Williams as well. I thank the Clerks and everyone else who has contributed to our proceedings. I give particular thanks to the Ministers, who have been very courteous, receptive and perhaps responsive—we shall see on Report. I have to say of the hon. Member for East Worthing and Shoreham that I just hope he does not have too many sneezing fits, particularly in inappropriate places.
We have had good debates, and I hope that we would all agree that it has been a privilege to serve on the Committee considering this very important Bill. The fact that so much work was done in the other place has enabled us to deal with some of the outstanding issues in quite a lot of detail. That has been a good thing. I just hope that we really will change things for the better and make a difference with this Bill.

Greg Pope: Thank you for those kind remarks and thank you also for being a well behaved Committee, with the exception of the debate on clause 1 stand part, when Mr. Brennan and Mr. Loughton were very naughty boys—that is particularly to be deprecated in front of an impressionable new Member.

Question put and agreed to.

Bill, as amended, to be reported.

Committee rose at twenty-six minutes past Four o’clock.